HRW
Soft on UN,
Puts Rwanda
Peacekeepers
in Somalia,
Ladsous' Rumors
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS, July
23 -- While
even the
normally
oblivious UN
has a debate
about the non
implementation
of Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon's
stated Human
Rights Due
Diligence
Policy in the
Democratic
Republic
of the Congo
and elsewhere,
the group
Human Rights
Watch issued a
report on DRC
on July 22
which did not
even mention
the UN's
rights
policy.
HRW's
focus was
entirely on
the M23
rebels, of
which it said
"M23
officers told
Human Rights
Watch that
some of the
Rwandan
fighters in
their units
told them they
had served in
Somalia or
Darfur as part
of
the Rwandan
army’s
peacekeeping
contingent."
Beyond
HRW's
increasing
partisanship
and softness
on the UN,
there may be a
problem: it
seems Rwanda
never send
peacekeepers
to the AMISOM
mission
in Somalia.
While HRW
and its
director Ken
Roth have been
typically
one-way media
since the
release of the
report --
triggering,
after a delay,
this follow up
article -- maybe
they will now
explain this.
What
they should
also explain
is their
omission and
lack of work
on the UN's
own 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."
At
latest
since the
November 2012
mass rapes, as
to the 391st
Battalion
of the
Congolese Army
there have
been
"substantial
grounds for
believing
there is a
real risk of
those forces
committing
grave
violations of
international
humanitarian,
human rights
or refugee
law."
Ladsous
tried to
cover these
grounds up, by
refusing to
disclose which
FARDC units
his
MONUSCO
mission was
supporting,
and which
units were in
Minova. He
openly refused
Inner City
Press questions
on this topic
at stakeout
after
stakeout,
video here.
But
when
it came out,
he claimed to
"intercede
with a view to
bringing those
violations to
an end." This
resulted in
only two
arrests, for
135 rapes, and
the cited
dozen
"suspension."
It
could
have been
foreseen that
this low level
of
accountability
would
not bring
violations to
an end. And it
did not: the
same 391st
Battalion, in
July 2013, was
involved in
abuses
including the
desecration of
corpses, which
Inner City
Press asked
Ban's
spokesperson
Martin Nesirky
about on July
16.
Clearly
stage three
of the Policy
has been
reached:
despite
intercession,
the situation
has persisted.
So the UN
"must suspend
support to the
offending
forces" -- but
has not.
The Policy has
been killed by
Ladsous
and the 391st
Battalion.
Immediately,
DPKO must be
made to
disclosure
which units it
supports, not
only in the
DRC but at
least the two
other
countries the
Security
Council has
applied the
Policy to,
South
Sudan and
Somalia.
But
HRW
is silent on
this, choosing
instead to be
a backstop to
Ladsous,
who was unable
in Security
Council
consultations
to articulate
any
factual basis
for what he
had said,
admitting that
it was "based
on rumors
we've heard."
From whom -
HRW?
Ladsous'
admission
about rumors
is ironic
given that he
has justified
his refusal to
answer Press
questions by
calling
reporting on
his statements
as
France's
Deputy
Permanent
Representative
at the UN
during the
Rwanda
genocide
"innuendo."
But Ladsous' statements,
and a memo,
are
matters of
record.
And they
should have
precluded the
UN, or really
France, from
installing him
atop thousands
of soldiers
and now drones
and an
Intervention
Brigade in the
Eastern Congo.
Footnote:
HRW's
July 22
missive listed
three
contacts, on
two
continents:
Carina
Tertsakian,
Ida Sawyer and
Sarah Margon.
It's
understood
they
were only
doing the job
they have
taken. But
others have
noted the
International
Crisis Group
advertising
for a "Congo
analyst"
-- maybe a
good spot for
"refugees"
from HRW's
increasingly
embarrassing
one-sided (and
soft on UN)
approach?