Democratic Republic of the Congo
/ Invitation by the Congolese Government to contribute a planning and liaison team to a joint Democratic Republic of the Congo/Rwanda military operation.
KINSHASA, Dem. Rep. of Congo (DRC) January 29, 2009/African Press Organization (APO)/ — Daily press briefing by the offices of the spokesperson for the UN secretary-general And the spokesperson for the general assembly president
I’ll start with an item on the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Alan Doss, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for the Democratic Republic of the Congo, has formally accepted an invitation by the Congolese Government to contribute a planning and liaison team to a joint Democratic Republic of the Congo/Rwanda military operation. The operation targets ethnic Rwandan Hutu militias based in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The decision was made yesterday as Alan Doss toured eastern Congo to assess the impact of the military operation on local civilians.
The United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC) says it will soon dispatch a group of staff military officers to the headquarters of the operation in Goma. Their mandate is strictly confined to planning and liaison. The goal of their assignment is to help increase the presence and gradual inclusion of United Nations civilian staff in the planning of the military operation. These civilian staff members will work on issues affecting humanitarian coordination, general civilian affairs and the demobilization, resettlement or repatriation of former Congolese or ethnic Rwandan Hutu fighters.
Noting that there has been a marked increase in the number of Rwandan Hutu fighters willing to be repatriated to Rwanda with the Mission’s support, United Nations officials say that the support for repatriation remains an option. So far 39 combatants have agreed to be repatriated to Rwanda and another 57 have recently registered for repatriation.
SOURCE : United Nations – Office of the Spokesperson of the Secretary-General
