UN General Assembly
2003

past years, truly needs assistance from the international community to regain peace, stability, economic growth and democracy. That is the meaning of the appeal made at Brazzaville on 17 May 2003 by the ECCAS Ministers at the meeting of the United Nations Standing Advisory Committee on Security Questions in Central Africa. Still with respect to our subregion, I would like finally to stress in particular the crisis that raged in the Democratic Republic of Sâo Tomé and Pr'ncipe in July 2003. At that time, ECCAS, the African Union, the Community of Portuguese-Speaking Countries and Nigeria worked in perfect concert to re-establish the constitutional order shattered in this country on 16 July 2003. While we commend the contribution made by the United States and South Africa, we would like to appeal again for the entire international community to give substantial assistance to the Democratic Republic of Sâo Tomé and Pr'ncipe, particularly to the emergency programme that has just been established by the Government of this country. We must also follow with great interest developments in Burundi, where every step forward 16