West African Speakers Call For Release Of Guinea's Conde

West African Speakers Call For Release Of Guinea's Conde
April 1, 2000 


OUAGADOUGOU, Burkina Faso (PANA) - National assembly Speakers from West African states ended their second conference in Ouagadougou Friday with a call for the "immediate and unconditional release" of the detained Guinean opposition leader, Alpha Conde.

Conde, a losing candidate in Guinea's presidential election in 1998, has been in detention without trial since 16 December that year on suspicion of "undermining internal security, utilisation of the armed force and complicity." His case is set to be heard on 12 April.

Numerous calls have been made on Guinean authorities to release Conde, who was arrested near the border with Cote d'Ivoire.

Meanwhile, the meeting adopted the constitutive charter of the conference of West African Speakers ahead of the envisaged creation of the ECOWAS assembly.

Delegates called for a quicker pace to promote sub- regional economic integration through the harmonisation of the various monetary zones within ECOWAS, beginning with the creation of some form of parity between existing currencies within the community, as a step towards a single currency.

The meeting in Ouagadougou was attended by Benin, Burkina Faso, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Mali, Niger, Sierra Leone, Togo, Liberia and Nigeria. 





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