On DR Congo, UN Admits Continued Minova Rape Case Delay, Insists Its Two Trucks in Anti Kagame Convoy Were "Taken Over"

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 13 -- After UN envoy Martin Kobler told the Security Council on January 13 about "the need to address ill-discipline within the [Congolese Army] FARDC and National Police and to pursue all outstanding cases of misconduct," Inner City Press asked him about the FARDC's mass rapes at Minova in November 2012. 

  Kobler acknowledged that the most recent hearing in the Minova case had been postponed, that witness statements have still not been taken. Video here, from Minute 6:32. 

  Given that the UN says it has a Human Rights Due Diligence Policy of not supporting army units engaged in abuses, how much longer will the UN accept this? Thirteen months and counting.

  Perhaps relatedly, after rumors of the death of Rwanda's Paul Kagame were shot down, across the border in the Eastern Congo, a time-stamped photograph was tweeted of a UN truck full of people on the back, captioned "MONUSCO in Goma celebrating the death of Pres Paul Kagame."

  It seemed worth asking the UN mission chief Martin Kobler to comment on or explain the photograph, and Inner City Press sent this, to Kobler and three MONUSCO spokespeople:

"Please comment on / explain this time-stamped photo, which is being described as a UN truck participating in "celebrations" of the rumor of the Rwandan president's death. Do you dispute that the photo was taken on January 10? To whom is the UN giving a ride in this truck / photo? In what context?"

   After a time, UN envoy Kobler replied:

"@innercitypress Ceci apparait de toute évidence comme une utilisation frauduleuse d'un véhicule de la #Monusco. C'est inacceptable"

  Translated: "This appears clearly as a fraudulent use of a vehicle of the #Monusco. This is unacceptable."

(Translation not by Google, not only because of NSA spying issues but also acquiescence in Digital Millennium Copyright Act abuse by Reuters UN bureau, click here for that.)

  The question became, now what does Kobler, or those above him in New York, do?  

  Inner City Press on January 10 went to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's press conference, 11 am in New York, to ask this question: "in the DRC this morning, after false rumors of Paul Kagame being dead, a MONUSCO truck was photographed in what some call celebrations and Martin Kobler told me is "unacceptable." What do you think your UN should do about this, in terms of the perception of impartiality or bias by the UN?"

  But Ban's acting deputy spokesperson Farhan Haq did not call on Inner City Press, instead automatically giving the first question to the United Nations Correspondents Association(a/k/a UN's Censorship Alliance), then mostly questions soft on the UN about Syria.

  Next came spin from MONUSCO, e-mailed to the Press:

Fraudulent use of MONUSCO truck in Goma

Kinshasa, 10 January 2014 - MONUSCO is aware of a photo being circulated on the internet showing a MONUSCO truck in Goma during a demonstration.

In reality, the truck was taken over by demonstrators while on a regular mission. The driver was alone and unarmed when the incident happened. MONUSCO condemns this agressivity against its assets.

MONUSCO has launched a full investigation to ascertain the circumstances and the context surrounding the incident. 

  But how does the UN explain, then, this UN jeep or Four by Four in this longer video of the anti-Kagame protests, from Minute 1:04 to 1:54? http://youtu.be/L9EPcUOpT1M

 On January 13, Inner City Press asked Kobler about the two vehicles. He said that both had been taken over, which now seems to mean that the UN drivers remained in the vehicles, carrying the protesters, on the single road from Sake to Munigi, through Goma.

  Kobler said the drivers were unarmed, but even if armed would not have tried to get the demonstrators off, at least not be using force. He said the protesters got off or disappeared out by the Uruguayan peacekeepers' base by the airport. There is more than a little skepticism. But that is what Kobler said: video here, from Minute 6:32.

   Watch this site.
   

Fog of War: UN Conceals Winner of Ladsous' Drone Contract & DRC Army Units It Supports

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, July 31 -- Some say for the UN to become a party to the armed conflict in Eastern Congo is a mistake.

But the UN is doing just that: on July 30 it set an August 1 deadline after which it will take offensive military actionagainst anyone who doesn't disarm in what it calls the "Security Zone" between Goma and Sake.

  Some characterize this as "protection of civilians," as UK Ambassador to the UN Mark Lyall Grant did, tweeting that the UK "has supported the UN Intervention Brigade, precisely to help stop murderous activities by M23 (and other armed militia)" and that he didn't think "women suffering sexual violence in DRC would see UN Peacekeepers disarming militia as 'UN going to war.'"

  This ignores that, for example, 135 DRC women and girls were raped in Minova in November by two units of the Congolese Army, the 41st and the (US trained) 391st Battalions -- both of which the UN still supports, despite accountability measures that are shockingly limited, and now undisclosed.

  On July 31 Inner City Press asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson Martin Nesirky about the 41st Battalion, about which company signed a drones contract with UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous, and if the Geneva Conventions apply to the UN. From the UN's transcript:

Inner City Press: There was a MONUSCO [United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo] press conference today in which they described a joint surveillance cells that they had established with the forty-first commando battalion in Sake-Goma, which is the security zone. Since this is one of the two battalions that was implicated in the rapes in Minova, is this support for purposes of the human rights due diligence policy to establish these joint surveillance cells? What’s the current tally of actual arrests or indictments made for those rapes, and is it possible to know which units of the Congolese Army MONUSCO would be providing support to, for purposes of the human rights due diligence policy as part of its newly announced disarmament initiative to begin in 24 hours?

Spokesperson Nesirky: Well, on the middle question, that’s one for the authorities. On the last part of your question and the first part of your question, for operational reasons with regard to the present circumstances, the Mission is not providing a full list of which units it is operating with and would support. So that’s the first bit. The second is with regard to the broader question you raised a number of times, the Department of Peacekeeping Operations is simply not putting into the public domain that information.

Inner City Press: One follow-up. How could the UN have a policy publicly announced like the human rights due diligence policy, which says they wont support abusive units and then refuse to disclose which units they do support? And when you’re saying it’s up to the Congolese authorities to disclose the arrests, at least as described by Patricia O’Brien, the UN must seek that information in order to make its risk assessment of potentials of abuse arising from its support. Is it an entirely secret policy?

Spokesperson Nesirky: No, no, not at all. Those two parts are not mutually exclusive. It’s for the authorities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo to provide information into the public domain on what arrests have or have not been made, who has been charged, who has been prosecuted. That’s self-evidently for the authorities, the Congolese authorities to do. It is not… that does not mean that it’s not possible for them also to provide that information to the peacekeeping mission there. And with regard to the more general point, this policy is about a process. You don’t decide from one day to the other if a unit has been accused of some kind of infractions — that is investigated under that policy and, of course, by the authorities, and that’s a process.

Inner City Press: Thanks a lot, I just wanted to get this out of the way. I wanted to ask two general things.

Spokesperson Nesirky: Just wait a second. I can see other hands in the room. Okay?

  After cutting away, when Nesirky returned he limited questions, disallowing one about Mali, and declining to name the beneficiary of a drones contract the UN has already signed:

Inner City Press: I have a question on Mali but I wanted to just finish on DRC. This seems to be something that’s right in the UN’s mandate to answer, whether the Geneva Conventions apply to the operation that the Intervention Brigade or MONUSCO has just announced, i.e., would it be making the Intervention Brigade a party to an armed conflict? And the other question, Hervé Ladsous announced during the Bastille Day in France that the drone contract had been signed. I’ve checked various databases that are publicly available. What’s the company that won? And if it’s not yet public, how could the UN be signing a contract declaring a winner and not have it be public? Is it public and what is the name of the company?

Spokesperson: I will check. I don’t believe it is public, firstly. Secondly, there is a very clear procurement process that’s in place, and with regard to the first part of your question, the mandate that the peacekeeping operation has in the DRC is fully compliant with international humanitarian law.

  Then Nesirky took no more questions on the topic, nor from Inner City Press about Mali or anything else. At a ceremony unveiling a new bike rack for the UN, when Herve Ladsous walked by Inner City Press asked him who won the UN drone contract. He did not answer. Video here. Watch this site.

   

Herve "Stonewall" Ladsous Won't Say If UN Would Defend Bukavu, Was Rejected to Head DPKO

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, November 21 -- After UN Peacekeeping did nothing as the M23 mutineers it calls so brutal took over first Goma, then Sake, and prospectively Bukavu, it seems certain that Herve Ladsous the chief of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations would be asked and have to answer, "Would the UN defend Bukavu?"

  But when Ladsous came out to the Security Council stakeout early Wednesday afternoon, he refused to answer the question. 

  His spokesman Kieran Dwyer, who has previously tried at Ladsous' behest to order censorship, this time called repeatedly for the UN microphone to be given to a French reporter. Video here, at Minute 11:50.

   No one else asked Ladsous the question, which is most directly his responsibility because of protests and threats against the people under his control who are in Bukavu, as in Bunia and Kisangani. 

   So Inner City Press asked the question, and each time Ladsous looked the other way. Video here, at Minute 10:13, 13:25 and especially 11:50.

   Afterward several Security Council diplomats shook that heads, one calling Ladsous' performance "unacceptable." But this is the UN -- France OWNS UN Peacekeeping, having appointed the last four chiefs in a row.

   The problem this time is that the selected and vetted Frenchman Jerome Bonnafront was, due to bragging in India, nixed at the last moment, as exclusively reported by Inner City Press. And so Ladsous was put in without review, and has tried to erase this history ever since.

  But there's more.

   Inner City Press has been told by a well placed source in the Secretariat at the time that Herve Ladsous was previously REJECTED for the post that Ban Ki-moon ended up letting him have, since it was "France's decision."

    All of this could have been addressed and answered early in Ladsous' tenure. But Ladsous immediately refused to answer any questions, including about his time as France's Deputy Permanent Representative during the Rwanda genocide in 1994, supporting the genocidaire government.

   Now, emboldened by other anti-press freedom moves in the UN, Ladsous has adopted a policy of not taking questions from questioners whose coverage he doesn't like. As one wag put it, it's a small taste of North Korea in Ban Ki-moon's UN. How is it acceptable? Watch this site.