All sides in Central African Republic’s civil war are looking to a peace conference this week in Brazzaville, the capital of the neighboring Republic of Congo, in the hopes that it could yield a cease-fire agreement. Congolese President Denis Sassou-Nguesso is presiding over the summit, which began yesterday and will run until July 23, under the auspices of the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS).
However, there are already major questions about what the meeting can actually achieve. As of the opening of the summit, it was still unclear who would be representing the main rebel group, Seleka. What’s more, Chad is not playing a leading role in the summit following recent criticism of its military activities in Central African Republic and its decision to pull its troops from the peacekeeping force there.
Given the uncertainty, Lucien Pambou, a researcher at the Paris-based magazine Geopolitique Africaine, said he was not expecting “any important resolutions [to be] taken at that meeting.”