UNITED
NATIONS, July
24 -- While
the Congolese
Army was
blasting away
at
Rumagabo on
Wednesday,
apparently
killing
civilians
including
children
there, Inner
City Press at
the UN in New
York
exclusively
asked French
Permanent
Representative
Gerard Araud
about the UN's
stated Human
Rights Due
Diligence
Policy,
quoted below.
Specifically,
Inner
City Press
asked how it
could be that
UN
Peacekeeping
chief
Herve Ladsous,
the fourth
Frenchman in a
row to hold
the post,
continued
UN support to
the 391st
Battalion of
the Congolese
Army
after it was
implicated in
135 rapes in
Minova in
November.
Now,
the same 391st
Battalion has
been
implicated in
the
desecration of
corpses. Has
the Policy
failed? Or has
Ladsous?
Araud
responded
citing higher
numbers of
arrests than
even Ladsous
has, and
saying "even
the Americans"
are in a tough
spot, since
the
391st is the
"best unit" of
the Congolese
Army, "which
doesn't have
many good
units." (The 391st
Battalion was
trained
by the US
in 2010; Inner
City Press requested,
obtained a US
Mission
comment, here.)
If
its "best"
units commits
mass rape and
desecrates
corpses,
what of the
other ones, in
Rumagabu for
example?
Secretary
General
Ban Ki-moon's
outgoing
deputy
spokesperson
Eduardo Del
Buey told
Inner City
Press the UN
doesn't know
anything about
that fighting
--
hard to
believe.
Of
the Human
Rights Due
Diligence
Policy and the
391st
Battalion,
Araud
exclusively
told Inner
City Press on
Wednesday that
"these
issues have
been raised in
the Council,
the
Secretariat
was following
it."
Of
the mass rapes
in November
Araud to his
credit endeavored
to give a substantive
answer,
saying, "after
Minova twelve
officers were
suspended,
twenty nine
soldiers were
arrested and
two
or there
indicted."
Other have
said that only
two of the
arrests were
for the rapes.
Inner City
Press has
repeatedly
asked the
UN; Ladsous'
four
spokespeople
have left
questions
unanswered for
twenty five
days (and
one of them
tried again to
bypass Inner
City
Press for
Ladsous'
favorite
Agence France
Presse again
on Wednesday,
story here.)
While
Ladsous and
his
spokespeople
have never
said it, Araud
on Wednesday
told Inner
City Press
that "they
said the
support to the
units
have been, I
guess,
drastically
reduced...
they didn't
say totally
cut."
Here
as promised is
the UN Human
Rights Due
Diligence
Policy as
explained
by Ban's
outgoing chief
lawyer
Patricia
O'Brien at a
July 9, 2013
meeting on
which Inner
City Press
exclusively
reported:
"First,
the
UN cannot
provide
support to
non-UN
security
forces where
there
are
substantial
grounds for
believing
there is a
real risk of
those
forces
committing
grave
violations of
international
humanitarian,
human rights
or refugee
law. Secondly,
where grave
violations are
committed by
non-UN
security
forces that
are receiving
support from
the UN, the UN
must intercede
with a view to
bringing those
violations to
an end. And
thirdly, if,
despite such
intercession,
the
situation
persists, the
UN must
suspend
support to the
offending
forces."
The
policy does
not speak of
calibrated
"reduction" in
support.
Also, Ladsous
clearly
miscalculated
on the risk,
as evidence by
the
continued
abuses
committed by
the 391st
Battalion, up
to desecration
of corpses.
Of
that, Araud
said, "Now
after what
jsut happen,
they are
re-assessing."
You would
think - but
given Ladsous'
refusal to
answer
questions, how
would you
know?
Araud
also tried to
spread the
blame away
from Ladsous,
up to Ban
Ki-moon
himself,
telling Inner
City Press
"the decision
is by the SG
himself, there
are several
entities, OLA,
DPKO, [Zainab]
Bangura and
Human
Rights, the
recommendations
are to the
S-G, now I
guess they
re-assessing."
Before or
after the
Congolese Army
kills more
civilians?
Watch this
site.
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