Central African Republic: "threats have not always come from CPC groups"
Jean-Pierre Lacroix, Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations in charge of peacekeeping operations, in Bangui on Friday, June 4, 2021. © RFI / Carol Valade
Text by: Carol Valade Follow
5 mins
The joint UN-African Union-ECCAS-EU delegation in the Central African Republic met with President Touadéra, political and religious actors and civil society to discuss the peace process, two years after the Khartoum accords and five months after the offensive of rebels of the Coalition of Patriots for Change in the capital.
The United Nations Deputy Secretary General in charge of peacekeeping operations, Jean-Pierre Lacroix, is RFI's guest.
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First of all, on the objective of this mission which you are completing, that is to say to evaluate the peace process. Recall that in Khartoum in 2019, the thirteenth peace agreement for the Central African Republic was signed and that despite everything, at the end of last year, there was the rebellion of the Coalition of Patriots for Change (CPC) which failed. take Bangui. The government now seems to favor the military option. What are the reasons to still believe in it?
Jean-Pierre Lacroix:
First, because we must never give up and because, if we did, we would be completely out of step with our principles, our values, our objectives. But also we would betray the Central African people. This peace agreement was not perfect, but it had the merit of creating a political framework in which those who signed it committed themselves to reduce violence. And the CPC groups violated their commitment, that's clear. As long as those who make the choice of violence do not abandon this choice in favor of dialogue, there is obviously a place for a response by force. And besides, Minusca has contributed and contributes to it. And it did so at a heavy price, since, as I recall, more than ten of our peacekeepers have been killed by members of armed groups since the start of the CPC rebellion.But we encouraged His Excellency President [Faustin-Archange] Touadéra to promote this approach of inclusive dialogue with political forces, and also with those of armed groups who have rejected violence or who have not joined the CPC.
At the end of your meeting with the Head of State, Faustin-Archange Touadéra, you spoke of “
threats, serious incidents
”.
Can you detail the content of these incidents?
Messages of hatred, disinformation and hostile demonstrations, manifestly or clearly manipulated.
What bothers us is that these hate messages, this disinformation are sometimes conveyed and organized by people who come from the majority in power.
And this is obviously very inconvenient.
How to understand that today the Central African Republic calls on Russian instructors who are, according to the United Nations Group of Experts on mercenarism are considered as mercenaries, to repel the rebels when there are already 12,000 peacekeepers in the country. Isn't it somewhere a failure of
the UN Stabilization Mission in the Central African Republic
?
First of all, it is not up to us, and we have told the President of the Republic, to pass judgment or make recommendations on the bilateral partnerships that a sovereign State chooses.
Yes, it is a speech that we hear.
Now, when we speak to all the interlocutors that we have met without exception, all of them have said to us: we want Minusca and the other organizations represented to stay and continue their activities.
Still on the Russian paramilitary forces, they would also be implicated in obstacles to the free movement of Minusca, searches of vehicles, threats on its representatives, destroyed equipment. What is your reaction to this state of affairs?
It is true that we have had cases of access restriction, cases of threats that have not always come from CPC groups.
There have been cases where the Central African forces and bilateral partners have indeed been engaged in this type of action.
We shared our concerns in this regard with the President of the Republic.
And the President of the Republic is committed to ensuring that we can continue to work under the conditions which are essential for us to be able to do this work.
The United Nations Group of Experts on Mercenarism has documented serious human rights violations allegedly committed by these paramilitaries.
La Minusca has a mandate to report on allegations of human rights violations.
This leaves the parties concerned, and in particular the host State, to carry out the necessary investigations to shed light on these alleged facts and that those responsible, if any, are brought to justice.
This is what we can say on this subject, which is obviously worrying because the population is affected, it has already suffered a lot.
We always think of it in everything we do, in everything our colleagues do on a daily basis in the field.
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