Africa is a continent beset by often seemingly insurmountable problems including conflict, debt, poverty and HIV/AIDS. The European Commission and member states collectively are the largest global donors of development assistance to Africa and the EU is thus in a position to play an important role in helping Africans address the problems of the continent.
There are two overarching themes which the Irish Presidency has decided to address during this Presidency which are of crucial relevance to Africa: poverty reduction and conflict prevention.
The Deputy will also be aware of the priority the Government has attached to children and armed conflict and human rights defenders as part of the EU Presidency. The issues of children and armed conflict and slavery are closely linked and the role of human rights defenders in highlighting instances of slavery and bonded labour is vital in focusing national and international attention. We are currently overseeing the satisfactory progress of the implementation of EU guidelines on children and armed conflict and EU partners have been circulated with a paper on draft EU guidelines for the support of human rights defenders. The EU conducts a process of political dialogue with African, Caribbean and Pacific countries which benefit from the Cotonou Agreement. Human Rights is a central theme of political dialogue.
While poverty can never be accepted as an excuse for human rights abuses, the Irish Presidency believes that poverty eradication should be the overriding objective of EU development policy, to be achieved by attaining the millennium development goals, MDGs.
It is the Presidency's belief that the EU should work towards the goal of poverty eradication by improving the effectiveness of its development assistance, strengthening the coherence of its policies that affect developing countries, working to enhance the voice of developing countries in multilateral institutions such as the UN, the Bretton Woods Institutions and the WTO and making further progress towards meeting the MDGs.
Conflict prevention is another overarching theme that Ireland has decided to prioritise in our relations with Africa during the Presidency. There can be no development without peace. Many African countries continue to experience or are gradually emerging from conflict, including Liberia, Cote d'Ivoire, Burundi, the DRC, Sudan, Somalia and Ethiopia-Eritrea.
Ireland also supports the special court in Sierra Leone, established in order to prosecute persons bearing the greatest responsibility for serious violations of international humanitarian law and certain crimes under national law. The special court has an important role in ensuring that there is no impunity for those who have committed grievous crimes in Sierra Leone.
Africa will also be a core theme in our engagement at the UN Commission on Human Rights in Geneva which is currently under way. Ireland, on behalf of the EU, will be tabling resolutions on the situation of human rights in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan and Zimbabwe. In addition, the Irish Presidency will table thematic resolutions on the death penalty and on the rights of the child, with the Latin American-Caribbean grouping, GRULAC, which has particular relevance to Africa. Ireland will also support Italy's technical resolution on Somalia regarding assistance on human rights. Ireland's traditional resolution on religious intolerance, which has universal application, has now been taken up by the EU and is being handled by our Dutch partners.