French soldiers on patrol in Bangui. Photograph: Issouf Sanogo/AFP/Getty Images; Image source: The
Guardian UK
|
A damning UN
report about how French soldiers raped and sodomized starving and homeless boys
in the Central African Republic, some as young as nine, has been leaked to the
Guardian, and the UN official who blew the whistle is facing dismissal.
French peacekeeping troops were supposed to be
protecting children at a centre for internally displaced people at M’Poko
Airport in CAR’s capital Bangui, when the abuse reportedly took place between
December 2013 and June 2014. It was at a time when the UN’s mission at the
country, MINUSCA, was in the process of being set up.
An internal investigation was ordered by the UN office
of the high commissioner for human rights (UNHCR), after reports on the ground
of sexual abuse of children displaced by the conflict.
A member of staff from the high commissioner of human
rights and a specialist from UNICEF interviewed the children between May and
June last year. Some of the boys were able to give good descriptions of
individual soldiers who abused them.
Officials in Geneva reportedly received the report in
summer 2014.
Swedish national, Anders Kompass, a senior UN aid
worker who has been involved in humanitarian work for over than 30 years,
passed the document on to French prosecutors because of the UN’s failure to
take action, sources close to the case told the Guardian.
The newspaper reports that after receiving the
confidential UN report entitled Sexual Abuse on Children by International Armed
Forces, French authorities traveled to Bangui to investigate the allegations.
A French judicial source said that the prosecutor’s
office had received the UN report in July 2014 and that a preliminary
investigation had been launched.
“A preliminary investigation has been opened by the
Paris prosecutor since July 21, 2014. The investigation is ongoing,” he said,
as quoted by Reuters.
The report made its way to Paula Donovan from the
organization Aids Free World, who then passed it to the Guardian.
“The regular sex abuse by peacekeeping personnel
uncovered here and the United Nations’ appalling disregard for victims are stomach-turning,
but the awful truth is that this isn’t uncommon. The UN’s instinctive response
to sexual violence in its ranks – ignore, deny, cover up, dissemble – must be
subjected to a truly independent commission of inquiry with total access, top
to bottom, and full subpoena power,” she said.
Last month, Mr Kompass was accused of leaking a
confidential UN report and breaching protocols.
Kompass was dismissed last week as director of field
operations and is now under investigation by the UN office for internal
oversight service (OIOS). One senior UN official even said that “it was his
[Kompass’s] duty to know and comply” with UN protocols on confidential
documents.
Bea Edwards from the US based Government
Accountability Project, a whistleblower protection and advocacy organization,
blasted the UN for what is little more than witch-hunt against someone who sought
to protect children.
“We have represented many whistleblowers in the UN
system over the years and in general the more serious the disclosure they make
the more ferocious the retaliation. Despite the official rhetoric, there is
very little commitment at the top of the organization to protect whistleblowers
and a strong tendency to politicize every issue no matter how urgent.”
France’s
Operation Sangaris in CAR began in December 2013. It is now being wound down as
Paris hands over security to an 8,500-strong UN peacekeeping force deployed to
contain the deadly conflict.
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