Updated: 06:17, Tuesday June 14, 2011
Sky News
Gadhafi
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday pressed all African states to demand Libyan strongman Muammar Gaddafi step down and take tougher action against his regime.
Seeking to wrest support from a leader who has helped them financially, Clinton also urged African countries topple Gaddafi's diplomats and increase their support for the opposition, saying their words and actions can help bring peace to Libya.
'I urge all African states to call for a genuine ceasefire and to call for Gaddafi to step aside,' the first US chief diplomat to speak to the African Union (AU) said during a visit to the body's headquarters in Addis Ababa.
She called on them 'to suspend the operations of Gaddafi's embassies in your countries, to expel pro-Gaddafi diplomats' and to increase support for and contact with the rebels' National Transitional Council (NTC).
'Your words and your actions could make the difference in bringing this situation to a close and allowing the people of Libya ... to get to work writing a constitution and rebuilding their country,' she said.
Senegal and Gambia are the only African states to have recognised the NTC as the legitimate interlocutor of the Libyan people, something the United States, Britain, Australia, France, Italy, Germany, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates have done.
On the third and last leg of an Africa tour that has taken her to Zambia and Tanzania, Clinton said the world needs the African Union to lead.
She said the AU can help guide Libya through a transition to a new government based on democracy, economic opportunity and security, a transition she said they describe in their own statements.
The lights in the conference room went out 10 minutes or so into her speech, but Clinton appeared unfazed and carried on in the dark saying: 'When things like this happen, you just keep on going.'
US diplomats have praised countries like South Africa, Nigeria and Gabon for supporting UN resolutions that opened the way for NATO-led military action against Gaddafi's regime.
But they said many countries have been reluctant to take a tougher stand as Gaddafi's oil money has provided them with key financial support. African institutions, including the AU, have also benefited, they said.
Clinton praised the more than half the 53 countries in Africa that have embraced democratic, constitutional and multi-party rule, but she asked the remaining autocracies to heed the warnings from the 'Arab Spring' revolutions.
'Rise to this occasion, show leadership by embracing a path that honour your people's aspirations,' she said.
'Create a future that young people will believe in, defend and help build.'
If they fail to do so, she warned, 'you will be on the wrong side of history and time will prove that'.
Clinton also praised Africans for increasingly taking on the responsibilities of solving Africa's own problems and crises, alluding to examples such as the deployment of African peacekeeping forces in Somalia.
She referred to the role of the African Union and subregional organisations, which include SADC in southern Africa and ECOWAS in west Africa.
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