In DR Congo, UN on May 30 Welcomed FDLR Surrender Even Envoys Called "Insignificant" on June 1, Herve Ladsous Refuses Press Questions

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, June 1 -- Sources in Eastern Congo complained to Inner City Press late last week that the supposed surrender of the Hutu FDLR militia was little but a scam. But on May 31, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric announced:

“From the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the UN [Organization Stabilization] Mission in [the Democratic Republic of the Congo] (MONUSCO) announced that, so far, over 100 rebels from the Forces Démocratiques pour la Libération du Rwanda, known by the acronym FDLR, have surrendered in North Kivu. The Mission has also received reports that the group has expressed its intention to begin the surrender process in South Kivu in 72 hours. The Mission welcomes this development...”

  Inner City Press immediately asked Dujarric:

Inner City Press: on the FDLR surrender, how does this 100 or 105 -- 105 with 102 weapons is the number that I’ve seen.... Inner City Press is told that some of the people surrendering are underage children, not necessarily child soldiers, not soldiers at all. How does this surrender compare to the compare to the UN’s estimated size of the FDLR force, and is it viewed as a significant action if in fact many of the people that surrendered weren’t fighters at all?

Spokesman: I don’t have any further details on it. You can ask the Mission. Obviously, if children are involved, they will be taken care of and not treated as combatants. Thank you.

   Asking UN Peacekeeping does not work. On May 29, chief Herve Ladsous when Inner City Press asked about the 130 rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army, only two convictions but continued UN support to the 41st and 391st Battalions, replied "You know I do not respond to you, Mister." Video here.

  Now on Sunday, June 1 the four envoys deride what the UN "welcomed" on May 30:

“Special Envoy of the Secretary-General to the Great Lakes Region Mary Robinson, U.S. Special Envoy for the Great Lakes Region and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) Russ Feingold, Special Representative of the African Union Boubacar Diarra, European Union Senior Coordinator for the Great Lakes Region Koen Vervaeke, and UN Secretary-General's Special Representative in the DRC Martin Kobler note the letter of April 18, 2014, signed by a representative of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), in which the author stated that the FDLR declared it would lay down its weapons on May 30, 2014, in two locations in North and South Kivu. Reports indicate that no such activity took place in South Kivu, and up until now, an insignificant number of low ranking combatants surrendered in North Kivu.”

    The UN "welcomed" the "insignificant number" of FDLR surrenders in North Kivu, and nothing in South Kivu, while Ladsous with his history in the region refused to answer Press questions. This is today's UN.

Background: Can a UN Under Secretary General on camera refuse to answer questions about providing military support to Army units charged with rape, and about procuring drones without required approvals, by saying “I do not respond to you”?

On May 29 in the UN Press Briefing Room, Herve Ladsous the head of UN Peacekeeping did just that, telling Inner City Press on questions of rape and drones, “You know I do not respond to you, Mister.” Video here and embedded below.

  Ladsous did it flanked by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Stephane Dujarric. He did it with no complaint or reaction from the similar head of the old UN Correspondents Association Pam Falk, who though arriving 15 minutes late was called on by Dujarric to lob a softball question before Inner City Press.

  Agence France Presse was called on -- AFP invoked the UNCA machinery against an article Inner City Press published showing that Ladsous was not Ban's first choice for the job. UNCA's board demandedoutright censorship of an article about its president's conflict of interest, renting an apartment to a UN Ambassador (there's more real estate shenanigans to come, June 7). 

  Inner City Press quit UNCA and co-founded the Free UN Coalition for Access, which opposes Ladsous' picking which media to answer, and UNCA insiders for accepting this.

  Afterward on May 29 Inner City Press asked Dujarric how this was acceptable. The question about Ladsous not applying Ban's supposed Human Rights Due Diligence Policy after only two Congolese soldiers were convicted of 130 rapes in Minova in November 2012, Inner City Press has asked Dujarric for weeks. He has still provided no answer, nor on Ladsous' drone procurement.

  Dujarric pointed to a separate answer by USG Ameerah Haq, not on the rapes or drones but logistics in South Sudan. This was appreciated and may be separately reported. But Ladsous is bringing all of UN Peacekeeping down, not only other officials but the troops working in the field. We'll have more on this.

   

In DR Congo, UNSC Meets North Kivu's Paluku, Tried Link with FDLR, Visits Mugunga, Failed French Promise of 2008 UNcovered

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, October 5 -- As the UN Security Council visits Mugunga camp for internally displaced people and meets with North Kivu governor Julien Paluku, some things must be reported -- particularly because the scribes hand-picked by France to accompany the trip are not. Reporting. Anything.

  Mugungu IDP camp was there in 2008. On that Security Council trip, which Inner City Press was on even at an earlier stage of its reporting work at the UN, then French Permanent Representave Jean-Maurice Ripert "waded into the crowd in Mugunga IDP camp outside Goma in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and said he and the Council are doing everything possible 'so you can go home.'"

  Inner City Press asked in its report on the trip, even then in 2008, "Does unqualified support for Joseph Kabila, and nodding dismissal of the country's legislature -- which questioned the politics and timing of the arrest of Kabila's main opponent -- qualify in this regard? Time will tell. On the other hand, the UN operationally is feeding and sheltering, sometimes in brutal conditions, destitute refugees and displaced people. In Mugunga, people live in huts of plastic sheeting, with floors of lava rock. Somehow 10,000 people are fed three meals a day."

  And that is the good work of the UN, or really, humanitarian agencies. But what of Ripert's 2008 promise, broadcast on France 24? Later in that trip, after a UN bullet shot a hole in the UN plane (from the inside), "in the Kigali airport, clutching a print-out an Inner City Press article, Ripert approached Inner City Press and demanded, 'Why did you write this?' How about, because it's true?"

Five years later, what has changed?

  As to Julien Paluku, his appearance in the UN Group of Experts report must be noted -- as well as allegations that he promoted contacts with the FDLR militia. From The Gulf Today / VirungaNews:

"an official in DR Congo’s North Kivu province, where the commander of the Rwandan Hutu rebel group Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) is based, is tasked with persuading the FDLR to resume co-operation with the DRC army and to 'plan terror attacks on Rwanda. Two FDLR political cadres, traveling on Belgian passports, are currently in Rutshuru in North Kivu to meet the FDLR command and convince them to resume co-operation with the Congolese army,' spokeswoman Yolande Makolo said. She identified the men as Faustin Murego and Joseph Nzabonimpa, both resident in Belgium, and gave the numbers of the passports on which they are traveling. Makolo said the two flew into the Ugandan capital Kampala on an Egypt Air flight and then made their way to the North Kivu provincial capital Goma, with the help of DRC intelligence agents. Murego was a lieutenant in the former Rwandan army and now lives in the Belgian city of Liege, Makolo said. Nzabonimpa was also an officer in the former Rwandan army and now lives in Brussels, where he works in IT, she said. Still according to Makolo, North Kivu Governor Julien Paluku asked the UN mission in DRC to fly the two men to Walikale, a town deep in the forest, so they could meet FDLR commander Sylvestre Mudacumura."

  What will the Security Council members say or do about that? Forget the French picked scribes -- they only have eyes for the M23. That's why France choose them.

  From the Group of Experts report, in which Inner City Press obtained and then exclusively put online earlier this year (as credited not only by BBC and Bloomberg, neither of which asked to go on this trip unlike, say, BBC in 2008) but by Congolese publication like Le Potential:

"On 22 May 2013, aware of this ongoing problem of movement of bags and the confusion it created, local authorities took the decision to stop any movement of bags from Bisie mine to the village of Njingala, where minerals are stored or transported to Goma. On 27 May, in a letter to the Congolese Minister of Mines, the governor of North Kivu, Julien Paluku, requested authorization to release all the minerals stored in the village of Mubi."

  So Paluku wanted to release those minerals. Click here for Inner City Press report from a panel discussion of conflict minerals and the US Dodd Frank Act held Thursday night at the NYC Bar Association as the Council and the French picked scribes took off on their trip.

  Paluku raised some mineral (well, gold) issues earlier, implicating American and French nationals in illegal gold smuggling. Click here for Inner City Press story from 2011. 

  Will US Ambassador Samantha Power raise that (as she did the Minova rapes by the US trained 391st Battalion of the Congolese Army, on which we continue to await a response from the US Mission to the UN, as it await a transcript requested from MONUCO)? 

  Will France's Deputy Permanent Representative Alexis Lamek, who at the last minute replaced on the trip Permanent Representative Gerard Araud, after he picked the scribes?

  In 2008, at least France's Permanent Representative Ripert was ON the trip, making his promises, including in front of BBC. Now in 2013, France hand-picked media who don't even report, at least two of whom lack credibility, and didn't send its Permanent Representative. And what ever happened to Ripert's promise? Watch this site.

   

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.

  

As Chirac Slams UN in DRC, Ladsous Cited by AFP But Not Held to Account

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 25 -- When former French president Jacques Chiraq was presented on Christmas Day in Le Monde and Agence France-Presse as deeply concerned about the Congolese, Inner City Press returned to Chiraq's memoir "My Life in Politics," recently published in English (though hardly reviewed anywhere).

  Nowhere in the memoir's six page index is there any mention of the Congo. The longest reference to Africa concerns the Bokassa and the Central African Republic, which France left in the terrible shape it finds itself today.

  So when Chirac could have done something for the Congo, he did nothing. Now long out of the limelight, promoting a book, he reappears as an opportunist. calling on the UN Peacekeeping mission MONUSCO to do more.

  Signing with him are, among others, Francophony minister Yamina Benguigui, Rosario Dawson, Muhammad Ali, Eve Ensler, Jonathan Demme, Angelique Kidjo and Valerie Trierweiler of the Danielle Mitterrand Foundation.

  AFP's Christmas story, emphasizing Chirac's call for the UN to fulfill its mandate, adds a quote from UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous last week that MONUSCO is on alert and reinforcements would be sent if necessary. 

  The AFP story does not note that Ladsous served on one of AFP's boards; click here for a recent French-language profile of Ladsous.

   But at the UN last week, as the weeks before, Ladsous refused to answer Press questions about the Congo, specifically about 126 rapes in Minova by the Congolese army which Ladsous' DPKO supports. 

  Click here for Ladsous' December 18 "seize the microphone" video; click here for his November 27 "hallway service" video, including Ladsous retreating to the hallway to brief a reporter from AFP and two others whom he has collaborated with.

   Despite the belated grandstanding, some feel, if France really wanted to do something for the Congolese people it would replace Ladsous as head of UN Peacekeeping. 

  Not only does he refuse Press questions - in the past week there have been two separate killings of four peacekeepers each time, and Ladsous has not come forward.

  His predecessor Alain Le Roy, also French, would invariable come and speak after such incidents. Ou est Herve Ladsous? And where should he be? Watch this site.

As UN "Assesses" Its Congo Rocket Fire, Ladsous Refusing Press Questions

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, July 18 -- More than 24 hours after UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous refused on camera to take Press questions if his mission in Congo killed civilians, Inner City Press put the question for a second time to Ban Ki-moon's deputy spokesman Eduardo Del Buey.

  Del Buey said the UN stands behind what lead spokesman Martin Nesirky said last week. But, Inner City Press pointed out, that was before reports emerged that the UN's 30 mm firing from helicopter gunships killed, among others, civilians Bushye Agathe.

  After Del Buey at Wednesday's noon briefing said the UN was standing behind what Nesirky said the previous week, before Inner City Press' question that Ladsous refused to take, then this e-mail came in: 

Subject: Your question on MONUSCOFrom: UN Spokesperson - Do Not Reply [at] un.org
Date: Wed, Jul 18, 2012
To: Matthew.Lee [at] innercitypress.com

Last week, MONUSCO engaged two of its attack helicopters in support of FARDC efforts to deter M23 elements near the villages of Ngugo and Nysisi, south of Rutshuru town, in North Kivu. The M23 elements were seen to be moving south toward Goma. MONUSCO had also received reports of human rights violations by the M23 in that area. The Mission attack helicopters used rocket fire and missiles to deter their further advances and protect the population.

MONUSCO is currently assessing the impact of the operation, which took place in a remote and heavily forested, mountainous area.

   Ladsous should have taken and answered and still should answer this question, since he is in charge of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations. But he refused, on camera, on July 17. Video here, from Minute 6:50.

 Ladsous began this strategy of explicitly conditioning answering or even taking question on getting positive -- and we and others posit, as yet unmerited -- coverage on May 29 in a televised press conference, and has continued it off camera since.

  (Inner City Press has quoted sources from closed door meetings of the Committee of 34 that Ladsous proposes that the UN uses drones, and several delegations think he already has the French firm Thales in mind.)

 But that reporting was from April. Ladsous' approach is at odds with Ban Ki-moon's claims about his administration's approach to the media. 

  We'll pursue this -- and, we hope, answers to the questions Ladsous refused to answer or even take, on top of the unanswered questions about DPKO introducing cholera into Haiti, and Ban and Ladsous having as a Senior Adviser on Peacekeeping Operations an alleged war criminal, Sri Lankan general Shavendra Silva. 

 Notably Ladsous did take Press questions earlier in May, and what he fastened on between then and May 29 is mysterious and / or troubling. Watch this site.