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UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs

DRC: UN's multinational force "totally insufficient", says crisis group

NAIROBI, 16 June 2003 (IRIN) - The French-led multinational force being deployed to Bunia, the main town in the embattled Ituri District of northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), is "totally insufficient", the International Crisis Group, a global analysis and advocacy organisation, said in a report published on Friday.

In its report, titled "Congo Crisis: Military Intervention in Ituri", the crisis group calls for a larger UN intervention force that covers a greater geographic area and stays much longer than the 1 September deadline currently mandated. The existing UN Mission in the DRC, MONUC, is expected to take over when the multinational force leaves.

The multinational force is "conceived only as a stopgap, to hold the line until additional MONUC troops are deployed in September", Francois Grignon, the group’s Central Africa project director, said in a statement issued with the report. He added that if the multinational force did not demilitarise Bunia, "it was likely to be caught in competing accusations from all the militias that almost certainly will lead to conflict".

Grignon said, "The militias must be cantoned at least 15 km out of Bunia to allow displaced populations to access the town freely and receive relief."

By mid-August, the crisis group added, MONUC must also have the physical capability, reinforced mandate and political backing to intervene in support of Ituri's pacification and be geared towards restoration of Congolese state sovereignty.

"There must also be sustained pressure on Rwanda, Uganda and Congo's leaders - and their proxy militias - to support the local pacification process in the area and finalise negotiations towards the establishment of a legitimate transitional Congo government," Grignon said.

The crisis group also said it was important that MONUC's reinforcement not be limited to Ituri, but to the provinces of North and South Kivu, to the south of Ituri, which have been at the heart of DRC's wars for the past decade and where the conflict's toll has been even higher.

"The pacification of Ituri should provide a formula for the wider, directly linked task of bringing stability and security to the entire eastern Congo," the crisis group stated.

[For the group’s complete report go to www.crisisweb.org]

Theme(s): (IRIN) Conflict

[ENDS]

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