Central African Republic – 27 May 2016

Central African Republic Rebels Demand Positions in Government

An armed group of Muslim fighters in the Central African Republic said it will only hand over weapons if some of its representatives are appointed to government positions.

Leaders of the so-called Seleka rebel group “must be represented in decision-making state institutions in order to facilitate the disarmament process,” Abdoulaye Hissene, a Seleka commander, told reporters Wednesday in the capital, Bangui. Hissene is based in the last remaining Muslim enclave in the city known as PK5.

Bloomberg

Head of UN mission in Central African Republic pledges to end troop abuses

The head of the UN mission in Central African Republic (CAR) has vowed to do everything possible to wipe out sexual exploitation and abuse by his troops, pledging to bring about a rebirth of peacekeeping.

To reach his goal of “zero occurrence” of abuses, Parfait Onanga-Anyanga, the head of Minusca, says UN member states need to take peacekeeping seriously and train and equip their troops adequately to deal with conditions in a brutalised land.

UN peacekeepers, as well as French and European troops, have been accused of sexually abusing children and adults in CAR, as well as other misconduct, since violence exploded in 2013, when mainly Muslim rebels ousted the president at the time and went on the rampage, killing men, women and children and triggering the formation of equally brutal anti-balaka militias.

The Guardian