Africans seek their own USA

African leaders have pledged to speed up the economic and political integration of their continent to pursue the goal of a United States of Africa, but they also agreed to take six more months to study the implications and timing of the proposed creation of a federated African state stretching from the Cape to Cairo.

The decision, announced close to midnight Tuesday, came after three days of often heated debate at an African Union summit in Accra, the Ghanaian capital. The gathering overran its scheduled closing time by half a day.

The accord represented a face-saving compromise between some leaders who wanted to set up a continental African government immediately, and others who favored a more gradual, step-by-step approach.