United Nations Radio

The Security Council today weighed calls for additional troops for the UN peacekeeping mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

More than two weeks of fresh fighting have displaced some 250,000 people, many of whom cannot be reached with humanitarian aid because of the fighting and heavy rains. UN Peacekeeping chief, Alain LeRoy, just back from a visit to the DRC, briefed the Council on his request for 3,000 new troops and police to reinforce the17,000 troops that make up MONUC, the UN peacekeeping mission. Mr. LeRoy said the fighting had forced MONUC to redeploy some of its troops to the eastern part of the DRC but there were still not enough.

LeRoy: We still consider that although we have almost 10,000 troops in the Kivus, it's still insufficient. The population of the Kivus is 10 million inhabitants. So it means 10 peacekeepers for 10,000 civilians to protect in the Kivus. So we consider additional forces would be very much needed, especially mobile forces. We don't have a reserve. We would very much like to have a mobile battalion to be able to come in case there is a specific incident, we would like to have a mobile battalion to come as soon as possible.

Both the head of the mission in the DRC, Alain Doss, and UN Secretary-general Ban Ki-moon have requested additional troops. The mission's mandate allows the troops to use force to protect civilians and peacekeepers if needed.

Diane Bailey, United Nations