MONUSCO supporting armed groups in eastern DRC

Fresh evidence has emerged showing the involvement of the United Nations Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUSCO) in supporting and creating a safe haven for armed groups in eastern DRC. Shockingly, MONUSCO is supporting the negative armed groups it is mandated to fight.

Reliable sources from eastern DRC confirm that on June 7, 15 combatants of the Nyatura Jean Marie/Abazungu Mai Mai faction who were fighting alongside Congolese forces (FARDC) against M23 rebels at a place called Muhati, sought refuge at a MONUSCO base located at Shangi. When the fighting got hot, 82 Nyatura combatants ran in disarray after being over powered by M23 fighters. 

The UN Mission kept secret the presence of the Nyatura combatants at its base in Shangi to avoid embarrassment and to hide their collaboration with negative forces operating in eastern DRC.  MONUSCO is likely to clandestinely move the 15 Nyatura combatants to a new location outside its camp, according to the source.

The collaboration of MONUSCO with negative armed groups in DRC is a betrayal of its mandate. It also confirms that the UN force, instead of helping to fight the negative armed groups, gives them support and safe passage, thereby being accomplices in escalating insecurity in eastern DRC.  The fact that the Congolese army and MONUSCO are working closely with armed groups like Nyatura, FDLR and many others, in a tripartite evil alliance – MONUSCO, FARDC and armed negative forces – poses a serious challenge to efforts meant to pacify the great lakes region, especially eastern DRC.

MONUSCO’s  core mandate includes  supporting the authorities of the DRC and  unilaterally, or jointly with FARDC, carrying out targeted and robust offensives  with a view to neutralize armed groups and help reduce the threat they pose to the state authority and civilians’ security. To the contrary, the UN force is in bed with the negative armed groups. 

Also, in close collaboration with other international partners, MONUSCO is expected to,  “accelerate the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration processes of the Congolese and foreign combatants who are not suspected of committing genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and individuals’ human rights abuses and the return of those combatants to a peaceful civilian life.” Instead, MONUSCO is helping genocidal forces like FDLR to regroup, with an intention of attacking Rwanda to complete the genocide against the Tutsi, which according to FDLR, was not completed in 1994. 

This is a dangerous precedent that should be investigated by the Extended Joint Verification Mechanisms (EJMV).  

The MONUSCO mandate remains on paper since its establishment  on July 1, 2010, through UN Security Council Resolution 1925, which also  allowed the UN force to have an intervention brigade meant to neutralize the armed groups in eastern DRC.

It is absurd to note that MONUSCO simply watched as two Rwandan soldiers were abducted by the FDLR from the border with DRC at the end of last month. 

For years, Rwanda has questioned why MONUSCO never attempted to neutralize the genocidal armed group.

The answer has always been that they could not locate the FDLR, yet reliable sources indicate that MONUSCO has for years closely collaborated with the coalition of negative armed groups.

There is evidence that in June 2014, MONUSCO sent a helicopter to FDLR leader Victor Byiringiro to fly him to Kinshasa, from where he would depart to Italy for a Sant’Egidio meeting.

This happened while the UN Group of Experts had, in their 2013 final report and 2014 midterm report, confirmed the collaboration between FDLR and FARDC.

What the UN experts missed out is that MONUSCO is also part of the conspiracy to support and protect negative armed groups contrary to its mandate.