January 12, 1999
Web posted at: 12:27 a.m. EST (0527 GMT)

UNITED NATIONS (CNN) -- A senior U.N. officials is saying that Julius Nyerere, the mediator overseeing the peace process in Burundi, is hoping regional heads of state will agree later this month to suspend sanctions on the country.

Nyerere, the former president of Tanzania, will use the next round of peace talks, beginning Jan. 18 in Arusha, Tanzania, to complete talks on lifting the sanctions against Burundi with the regional leaders. He expects them to take a formal decision at a Jan. 23 regional summit in Arusha that will follow the talks, said the official.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, briefed reporters after the start of a meeting Monday at U.N. headquarters between Nyerere and donor countries as well as other U.N. agencies such as the U.N. Development Program, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

The United States, Sweden, the European Union, Norway, the Netherlands pledged new funds at the meeting to help the Burundi peace process, the official said.

A recent U.N. report said the sanctions had outlasted their usefulness and were having devastating effects on Burundi's poverty-stricken population.

Burundi's neighbors -- Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Rwanda -- slapped an embargo on the tiny Great Lakes nation after Pierre Buyoya, a Tutsi and retired general, took the presidency in a bloodless coup in July 1996.

Their main condition was that Buyoya start talks with Hutu rebels engaged in a bloody conflict with the country's Tutsi-dominated army.

Buyoya said only he could halt the ethnic bloodshed between the Tutsi military and Hutu rebels that has claimed over 200,000 lives since Tutsi paratroopers in 1993 killed the country's first democratically elected president, a Hutu.

The violence has continued, with attacks by rebels of the 85 percent Hutu population trying to oust Buyoya and retaliations by the military run by the country's 14 percent Tutsi minority.

Buyoya claims he has met the demands for lifting the embargo, including a return to democratic institutions and opening of dialogue towards peace.

The U.N. official said Nyerere largely agrees.

The former Tanzanian leader has always made clear that he wanted to see real evidence Buyoya was committed to sharing power that the so-called Arusha peace process requires, the official said.

"He has now accepted that they have given evidence of real commitment," the official said. "His view then is the time is right to move for a suspension of sanctions."