THE MULTINATIONAL FORCE FOR THE CONGO

Abstract

The United Nations (UN) Security Council’s recent unanimous decision to authorize the Interim Emergency Multinational Force to supplement the UN peacekeeping operation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is a welcome development. It challenges two widely held assumptions: that the UN is irrelevant, and that France and the United States can no longer work together. The French-led 1,400-strong multinational force (MNF) will be deployed in Ituri, a region of north-eastern DRC that has witnessed atrocities similar in brutality, if not scale, to the genocide in Rwanda. While a necessary and important response, it is insufficient and is likely to create new challenges. The alacrity with which the Council has acted is noteworthy, but it is also an indictment of previous policies. The international community should build on the Council’s heightened interest to re-examine the assumptions upon which the UN peacekeeping organization, known as MONUC, is based. Otherwise, the Council’s resolution will likely be viewed as another in a long line of halfsteps and missteps, which have exacerbated and perpetuated a humanitarian and moral nightmare. Put simply, the approach of UN member states—particularly the five permanent members of the Council—to the crisis in the Great Lakes and DRC, formerly Zaire, has been shameful. In April 1994, the Council’s initial response to the genocide in Rwanda was to withdraw most of its peacekeepers rather than augment the mission. Four weeks into the slaughter, it changed direction and authorized a larger mission. The Council did so, however, with the full knowledge that it would take several months for the poorly-equipped troopcontributors to deploy their contingents. As an interim measure, it eventually authorized a French-led force that is credited with saving tens of thousands of lives, but also creating a situation in which advocates of, and participants in, the genocide were able to withdraw to Zaire (many with their weapons) and regroup to pursue their struggle. Two years passed, during which the humanitarian, security, and environmental situation in north-east Zaire deteriorated. Member states failed to heed former UN SecretaryGeneral Boutros Boutros-Ghali’s pleas for a proper international force to protect Rwandan refugees and by extension the host population and countries in the region. In November 1996, the Council authorized a Canadian-led multinational force to create a humanitarian corridor to ease tensions and facilitate the dispersal of aid. But before that force was deployed, the mission was abandoned because an insurgency led by Laurent Kabila resulted in several hundred thousand Rwandan refugees returning home. Relatively THE MULTINATIONAL FORCE FOR THE CONGO COMMENTARY