By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, February 6 – On the 126 rapes by Congolese security forces in Minova in late November, new information emerged on Wednesday from an unlikely but welcome source: UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous.
Inner City Press asked Ladsous how the UN's Human Rights Due Diligence Policy was being applied to the 126 rapes, and if the UN has continued to work for the past two months with units of the Congolese Army (FARDC) which were present in Minova during the rapes.
Ladsous replied that the “UN investigations have identified 126 cases of rape and in most cases, the identity of the perpetrators.”
This is a major statement. But has the UN continued to work with them?
Are those of whom Ladsous said the UN will “permanently... not work with them” limited to the line soldiers who committed the rapes, or the commanders of the units from which the rapists came?
This question remains to be answered, hopefully soon. Ladsous went on to say, “it is for Congolese to prosecute them,” and he called the prosecutions so far “too few.”
This should be addressed: of the eleven soldiers arrested so far by the South Kivu prosecutor, none was for the rapes in Minova in late November. The three charged with rapes involve unrelated incidents in December, two in Buganga, This must be followed up.
So too much the impact and lessons of the introduction of cholera to Haiti, allegedly by the UN mission MINUSTAH though peacekeepers from areas of Nepal where cholera is endemic.
Inner City Press asked Ladsous what safeguards have been implemented to try to prevent the UN from spreading deadly diseases in the future. As Inner City Press has previously noted, even UN Volunteers are subject to a battery of screening tests before being deployed.
Ladsous' response, while appreciated, did not address any safeguards. Rather he recounted that the UN has “spent $180 million on clear water project” and mentioned Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's “initiative for the eradication of cholera in Hispanola, Haiti and Santo Domingo.”
Referring to his January visit to Haiti, Ladsous noted for example that “the penal code has not changed since 1835.” He said “it is clear there are a number of processes that need to be speeded up.”
This includes finding a replacement for now-gone Special Representative of the Secretary General Mariano Fernandez – a candidate Honore from Trinidad and Tobago was put forward by Ban but rejected, as exclusively reported by Inner City Press.
Now Nigel Fisher, previously considered for a thematic (or “horizontal,” in Ladsous' parlance) post is the acting SRSG. But in the geo-political way in which the UN works, not only for the top post in Peacekeeping but also the SRSG posts, the Haiti job “belongs” to Latin America and the Caribbean. Watch this site.
Footnotes: Inner City Press prefaced the two questions by thanking Ladsous for his presence, on behalf of the Free UN Coalition for Access.
Since December 2012, FUNCA has been raising the need for reforms including briefings and answers by all Under Secretaries General – not only Herve Ladsous, who in a process that began in May and we hope has now ended refused to answer Press questions, but also Jeffrey Feltman of Political Affairs.
After Ladsous' briefing on Wednesday, Ban's spokesman Martin Nesirky announced that on Friday Feltman will be the guest at the noon briefing, his first sit-down press conference since assuming his post. FUNCA likes – but there is much more to do. Watch this site.