Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what contingency plans he has to respond in the event that the Burundian government does not peacefully accept the presence of 5,000 peacekeepers proposed by the African Union in December 2015.

The UK's immediate priority is to continue to put pressure on the Burundian government to halt the violence and engage in dialogue without preconditions. I wrote to the Burundian Foreign Minister on 5 January pressing the Government to do this. In the event of a serious deterioration on the ground and the Burundian government not accepting the African Union peacekeepers then we would support the African Union in planning for an intervention without approval. We also continue to work with the UN to ensure that the UN Department of Peacekeeping prepares a contingency plan. I intend to raise these issues with the Burundian Foreign Minister during the African Union Summit at the end of this month.