Mombasa, Kenya (PANA) - African education ministers kicked off a three-day meeting in Kenya's seaside resort of Mombasa Monday with a plea to the world's richest economies to dedicate at least one percent of their US$1.4 trillion military expenditure to help fight illiteracy in Africa, blamed for fueling conflicts.

Kenya's Education Minister, Prof. Sam Ongeri, told African education ministers meeting here 14-16 Sept. to discuss the role of education in combating African conflicts - that a one percent

The LRA has been blamed for worsening humanitarian crisis in North-Eastern Congo.

The African leaders called for renewed military action against the rebel group to neutralise its destabilising activities in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), South Sudan and the Central African Republic (CAR), from where hundreds of thousands of people

According to World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates, NTDs afflict about one billion people, or one-sixth of the world's population, mainly the poor.

In one of its recommendations, this first follow-up meeting on Integration of Onchocerciasis (river blindness) Control

Le communiqué indique que les forces ougandaises se retiraient des bases de Magwi, Palutak et Tibika dans la province équatoriale, au Sud-Soudan.

"On rappellera que la LRA avait

Selon le communiquÈ, le ministre de l'IntÈrieur, Ruhakana Rugunda, va diriger l'Èquipe gouvernementale qui va consulter le dirigeant sud-soudanais, Silva Kiir, sur les nÈgociations de paix avec la LRA, un mouvement rebelle en lutte contre le gouvernement de M. Museveni depuis le nord de l'Ouganda depuis ces 20 derniËres annÈes.

"We are really not taking this seriously at all. This is not a new tactic," Information Minister and government spokesman James Nsaba Buturo told PANA Wednesday.

He was reacting to media reports quoting Vincent Otti, the LRA's second in command, as having called for resumption of peace talks with the Kampala government.

Otti said he was speaking on behalf LRA leader Joseph Kony.

Kagame failed to arrive at Entebbe International Airport where three Ugandan ministers, two ambassadors, a presidential security detail and motorcade vainly waited for more than two hours to receive him.

President Yorweri Museveni had delegated Works and Communications Minister John Nasasira to receive President Kagame, who was expected to attend the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa

Meantime, women from the Great Lakes region, who recently met in Kigali, want more representation on peace processes in the region, according to a press release from the office of the special representative of the UN Secretary General for the Great Lakes region obtained Tuesday by PANA.

The women, drawn from Burundi, DR Congo, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Rwanda -- seven of the 11 core countries

"The Ituri issue falls in the remit of a commission for the pacification of Ituri created in the aftermath of the accord signed in Luanda between Presidents Joseph Kabila ad Yoweri