Word: congoes
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...countries have exposed the limitations of peacekeeping as much as Congo. MONUC (the initials for the French translation of the United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo) appears overwhelmed as rival military forces, from rebels to the nation's army, take turns ravaging parts of the country. Alan Doss is perhaps the world's foremost expert on peacekeeping. In a lifetime career at the U.N., he ran the peacekeeping operations in Liberia, Cote d'Ivoire and Sierra Leone before being transferred to Congo in October 2007. He spoke to TIME's Africa bureau chief, Alex Perry, by telephone...
...pictures of Congo on the brink here...
...MONUC's 17,000 soldiers outside the area where the fighting is? Doss: We are redeploying. As we speak, there are units being moved into the area. But we really are stretched to the limit. We are robbing Peter to pay Paul. South Kivu [a province of Congo] is tense. So is Ituri [another province in the country], and we have the LRA [Lord's Resistance Army, a rebel group that originated in northern Uganda] in the northeast. We are doing short-term reinforcements, but we simply do not have an effective rapid-reaction force...
...support for the Congolese army, which seems to be one of the most destabilizing and brutal elements in the conflict? We do not have an alliance with the Congolese army. We are a U.N. peacekeeping force [acting] in support of the FARDC (Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo). But it is clear that the FARDC is becoming part of the problem, not part of the solution. It's clear the army is disintegrating. That's one of the big dilemmas for us. We came out to Congo with a certain function - to reinforce the authority of the state...
What with the world economy in the throes of a precipitous slowdown and even Africa's crisis agenda now dominated by the upheavals in eastern Congo and the exploits of Somalia's pirates, it's easy to forget all about Zimbabwe - which is exactly what President Robert Mugabe may be hoping will happen. Mugabe and his inner circle have doggedly fought to maintain absolute control over Zimbabwe, despite having agreed on Sept. 15 to share power with the opposition, in order to resolve the political crisis resulting from the ruling party's refusal to accept the results of the March...