In DRC, UN Supports a Government Reported to Lock Up Its Critics, Jam Radios

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, August 13 -- It's already become a trend for this UN to remain silent amid crackdowns on the press and free speech in some countries. But now in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the UN is militarily supporting a government which is reported to arrest elected parliamentarians for "insulting the president," Joseph Kabila.

Muhindo Nzangi, MP for Lubero, appeared on Kivu Radio on August 10. Afterward he was reportedly charged with insulting Kabila, and arrested. The UN has refused to answer Inner City Press' questions from June, when it exclusively published the full text of the Group of Experts report, on which units of Kabila's Army it is providing support to.

At the UN's August 12 noon briefing, Inner City Press asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's outgoing deputy spokesperson Eduardo Del Buey:

Inner City Press: In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, there is an uptick in violence in Katanga Province, which is not in the Kivus, but in which they say civilians are being killed. And so one is, is MONUSCO [United Nations Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo] doing anything on that? What’s their response to that? And as to the Kivus, the M23 [23 March Movement] has said that they are sticking by what they agreed to in Kampala and they are not going to relinquish their positions near the Goma airport, and the spokesman for MONUSCO has said that they intend to expand the weaponless zone to include those positions. So, does the UN still view what was agreed to at Kampala as a binding agreement or does this announcement by the MONUSCO spokesman supersede that?

Deputy Spokesperson Del Buey: Well, I’ll have to get back to you on that. What I have for you is that the objective of the security zone is to provide better protection to the over 1 million civilians, including internally displaced persons living in the area. UN peacekeepers and Congolese security forces will continue their patrols and to ensure the area is free of unauthorized weapons. The Mission adds that the security zone is not an offensive operation and is not targeted against any one group. They are there to protect civilians.

Inner City Press: if you could, what’s the relationship between enforcing this zone and those agreements that were reached at Kampala? I know that Susana Malcorra went there, there was a signed agreement of where positions were supposed to be, does that mean a position without weapons? It seems like there is a brewing problem?

Deputy Spokesperson: Well, I’ll have to find out, Matthew, I don’t have any information with me.

  Twenty hours later, no answer has been provided. UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous, who refuses to answer Press questions even when he is in New York, is nowhere to be seen (although he had his spokesperson Kieran Dwyer spoon-feed a half-response to questions Inner City Press asked on June 24 to another media.)

  There are reports of a new radio station in the Kivus being jammed by the government, a sort of Debbie Does Dungu. But given how far the UN's ostensibly support of free speech and free media has fallen, what would UN Headquarters or Ladsous say about that? Perhaps newly arrived envoy Martin Kobler. Watch this site.

Footnote: The UN providing military support to a government which arrests its critics for what they say on the radio is a larger example of events inside UN Headquarters, where Ban's Department of Public Information combined with its UN Censorship Alliance to purport to ban (some) signs on media office doors.

  Then the Alliance has threatened Inner City Press'accreditation with suspension or withdrawal for merely hanging a sign of the new Free UN Coalition for Access on the door of its shared office, while UNCA has five signs. UNCA "leaders" are engaged in anonymous social media trolling, stirring up haters even from the Great Lakes region. This is today's UN.

   

UN Report Shows DRC Army Taxing Conflict Gold, Mined by FDLR, Waiting for Ladsous

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive Full Text

UNITED NATIONS, June 30 -- There is a lot of talk at the UN against conflict minerals, the exploitation of natural resources for conflict. But does the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations under Herve Ladsous live up to this?

As with Ladsous' non-enforcement of the UN's supposed conditionality and human rights due diligence policies with regard to the Congolese army units implicated in 135 rapes in Minova in November, the UN's stated principles are being systematically undermined.

Pursuing the Minova abuses since last November, in the face of repeated Ladsous refusals to answer, Inner City Press asked the UN for a list of the units of the Congolese army (FARDC) which it supports. The UN, or Ladsous' DPKO, refused.

  Now the new UN Democratic Republic of the Congo sanctions report, which Inner City Press put exclusively online early yesterday, lists FARDC units involved in conflict gold, even in locked up miners who refuse to pay their “tax” in underground prisons. A sample paragraph:

165. The 10th Military Region of FARDC controls the Mukungwe gold mine, in Walungu territory, South Kivu (see S/2011/738, paras. 528-532). At this site, FARDC soldiers collect illegal taxes weekly from artisanal miners. Miners who fail to pay are arrested and held in an underground prison until payment of the tax is made. The Group obtained an October 2012 letter from the president of one of Mukungwe’s local cooperatives that reminded the local army intelligence officer that the weekly tax of 1000FC (USD 1.11) per miner needs to be split between the ANR, the police and the army (see annex 73). A former FDLR officer in charge of logistics told the Group that the FDLR also collected taxes from miners working in Mukungwe, as well as in Rukatu mine, in Mwenga territory; FDLR accrues USD 2000 per month from both mines.

  Inner City Press has previously reported on FARDC support to the FDLR militia -- which Ladsous' MONUSCO denied in a vituperative press release of January 30, 2013. Here's a paragraph about the FARDC-supported FDLR:

According to a former FDLR officer and gold traders in Butembo, the FDLR are involved in gold mining in North Kivu’s Lubero Territory. According to several former FDLR combatants, FDLR commanders are also drawing profits from gold mines in Walikale. In some instances, FDLR combatants search for gold themselves, and in other cases, they tax gold miners, demanding their production one day per week.

So has MONUSCO supported FARDC’s 10th Military Region?

  Inner City Press already has specific questions pending at DPKO without yet an substantive response. Inner City Press has asked DPKO chief Herve Ladsous' four top spokespeople to comment on these issues -- and, incidentally, if they have a new position on their MONUSCO's January 30, 2013 press release denouncing the publication (now confirmed by the Report) of links between the FARDC and FDLR, by Inner City Press. Now, DPKO confirmed receipt more than 22 hours before this publication, but so far no substantive response.

  On questions ranging from the 135 FARDC rapes in Minova through the kidnapping of UN peacekeepers in the Golan Heights, the introduction of cholera into Haiti and Ladsous and Ban Ki-moon accepting as an adviser of a Sri Lankan military figure depicted in the UN's own report as engaged in war crimes, Ladsous' strategy has been to provide answers to Inner City Press' questions to other, friendlier journalists.

  Now evidence has emerged that for at least one of these outlets, Reuters' UN bureau, the flow goes the other way to, with the provision to the UN of information ostensibly only for the UNCA group that the UN should not have, here. This is being pursued by the new Free UN Coalition for Access, @FUNCA_info.

  Ladsous is today in Mali (where as noted he is incorporating a UN listed child soldier recruiting country into DPKO's peackeeping mission MINUSMA to be so launched tomorrow). But Ladsous, ever since Inner City Press asked about his statements during the Rwanda genocide, has refused to answer Inner City Press' questions, video compilation here. Watch this site.