INTRODUCTION

On 24 January, the UN Security Council’s ‘Month of Africa’ debate reached its climax with a day-long meeting on the situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The meeting was addressed by no less than seven African heads of state, nine ministers and the secretaries-general of the United Nations and the Organisation of African Unity. The UN’s Integrated Regional Information Network (IRIN) attempted to assess the impact of the initiative launched by US Ambassador Richard Holbrooke in his capacity as President of the Council for January 2000, through an interview with the UN Secretary-General. According to Annan:

"The ‘Month of Africa’ in the Security Council has had tremendous impact on the world’s consciousness - and conscience. More than that, I believe it has served as a genuine catalyst to explore possible solutions to some of the major problems that the region faces, from the conflicts in Burundi, Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo, to the impact of AIDS and the plight of refugees and displaced persons."1

In practical terms, the Secretary-General stated that the Council meeting on Angola had reinforced its view on the root causes of the conflict and the need to advocate for a political settlement. It also provided information on the ability of UNITA rebels to circumvent arms and diamond sanctions and it awaited further recommendations from Ambassador Robert Fowler of Canada, the chairperson of the Security Council Sanctions Committee, on how to strengthen the sanctions regime.

Regarding Sierra Leone, Annan pointed to the fact that the United Nations Assistance Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) is being deployed throughout Sierra Leone, with battalions from Ghana, India, Kenya and Nigeria taking up positions in major points across the country during February, and with a battalion from Guinea expected to be deployed soon. Importantly, he confirmed that he had urged the Security Council to authorise an expansion in the troop strength of UNAMSIL, from its current ceiling of 6 000 troops to one of 11 100 troops, to prevent a security gap from occurring, following the announced withdrawal of troops of the Economic Community of West Africa (ECOWAS) Monitoring Group (ECOMOG).

Annan said that the Burundi meeting drew attention to the problem of re-groupment, and was accompanied by an announcement by the government of Burundi that it would begin to dismantle some of the camps in Bujumbura Rural. In summary, the Secretary-General concluded that:

"[t]he ‘Month of Africa’ was a success not merely in drawing attention to the persistence of many of the region’s long-running conflicts, but in giving a push to actual peace efforts. The real test now is for the momentum to be sustained."2

If the real test lies in sustaining the momentum towards peace in these countries that have been plagued by pernicious armed conflicts for years, then the acid test must be the case of the DRC.

Indeed, Richard Holbrooke has been telling UN officials and members of the US Congress that the Congo operation may be the UN’s last chance to prove it can get peacekeeping right. This was the message he delivered directly to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on its field trip to New York the week prior to the meeting on DRC.3 But is there even an outside chance of resolving this particular conflict - described by Madeleine Albright as Africa’s first "world war"4 - through the medium of international intervention?

UN peacekeeping involvement in Sierra Leone may be criticised for being too little and too late. However, UNAMSIL has a chance of success exactly because it was deployed after nine years of conflict and some heavy enforcement action by the regional ECOMOG force. The two major parties to the conflict, and indeed the people of Sierra Leone, have a real interest in making the Lomé accord work.

In the DRC, it can be argued that the UN, along with the OAU and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) did too much too early (in the realm of peacemaking), while the enforcement action that was taken by ‘SADC allied forces’ lacked the support of the international community and the subregional body. The ‘peace makers’ and the ‘peace enforcers’ have thus been at odds from the outset, creating a very shaky foundation for the final layer of international response to the conflict - the deployment of UN peace keepers.

LAYERED RESPONSES TO THE CONFLICT IN THE DRC

The present conflict in the DRC spawned a variety of incoherent ‘peacemaking’ responses at different levels of the layered response hierarchy. These have included armed intervention by neighbouring states on both sides of the conflict, and a host of diplomatic efforts by SADC member states and a plethora of other actors. Indeed, military hostilities had hardly commenced on 2 August 1998 before the first of a number of increasingly complicated responses to the conflict occurred.

Within a week, Zimbabwe, followed by Angola and Namibia, had sent troops to defend Kabila’s regime. This intervention by three SADC member states was endorsed at a meeting of SADC defence ministers in Harare on 18 August 1998 - giving the impression of a subregional mandate and hence legitimacy to the intervention as an exercise in regional conflict resolution. But the SADC heads of state and government never forged consensus around this intervention, and followed the path of peacemaking while a controversial enforcement operation was still under way.

At an emergency summit of SADC leaders, convened in Pretoria on 23 August 1998, the heads of state confirmed their recognition of the legitimacy of the government of the DRC and called for an immediate cease-fire, to be followed by political dialogue on a peaceful settlement to the crisis. The meeting mandated President Mandela, as chairperson of SADC, to organise a cease-fire in consultation with the OAU Secretary-General. However, at the 18th SADC Summit the following month, the regional heads of state and government appointed Zambian President Frederick Chiluba to lead mediation efforts, assisted by the presidents of Tanzania and Mozambique.

While Pretoria embarked on the track of quiet, behind the scenes diplomacy in support of the peace process, other actors made dramatic announcements on breakthroughs in the peace process. For example, during the 20th Franco-African Summit held in Paris in November 1998, President Jacques Chirac announced that a DRC cease-fire agreement would be signed within a month.

At this stage, the UN Security Council had issued several presidential statements calling for an end to hostilities in the DRC. But it was only on 9 April 1999 that the Council decided to put some weight behind the peace process by agreeing on Resolution 1234. The resolution demanded "an immediate halt to the hostilities" and called for:

"the immediate signing of a ceasefire agreement allowing the orderly withdrawal of all foreign forces, the re-establishment of the authority of the Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo throughout its territory, and the disarmament of non-governmental armed groups in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and stresses, in the context of a lasting peaceful settlement, the need for the engagement of all Congolese in an all-inclusive process of political dialogue with a view to achieving national reconciliation and to the holding on an early date of democratic, free and fair elections, and for the provision of arrangements for security along the relevant international borders of the Democratic Republic of the Congo."5

A tall order indeed, but this is typical of the formula that has been applied in ‘new generation’ peace missions. The terms of Resolution 1234 would come home to haunt the UN Security Council in the form of the Lusaka accord. Of course, the Council also expressed its support for the regional peacemaking initiatives of the OAU and SADC, and called upon the international community to continue to support these efforts.

But it was neither the OAU nor SADC that made the breakthrough. Colonel Gadhafi brokered a DRC/Uganda cease-fire accord that was signed in Sirte on 18 April 1999. This agreement - which provided for the deployment of peace keepers, the withdrawal of foreign troops, and the initiation of a national dialogue - was welcomed by the Security Council. Both the Rally for Congolese Democracy (RCD) and Rwanda refused to be bound by the agreement. However, a team of 62 Libyan ‘peace keepers’ was dispatched to Kampala.

The peace process was further complicated by an announcement on 17 May 1999, that the RCD had ousted Ernest Wamba dia Wamba. Henceforth, peace makers would have to deal with three de facto rebel movements - RCD-Goma, RCD-Kisangani, and the Mouvement de liberation congolais (MLC).

Nevertheless, a meeting of regional leaders, held in Pretoria on 17 June, brought together leaders from the fourteen SADC member countries, as well as Rwanda, Uganda, Libya and Kenya, and paved the way for a DRC summit - scheduled for 25 June in Lusaka - with the purpose of signing a cease-fire agreement. The long awaited Lusaka summit was subject to several lengthy delays, as the preceding meeting of foreign ministers struggled to reach agreement on the technicalities of a draft cease-fire agreement.

Eventually, on 10 July 1999, the agonising Lusaka process gave birth to a cease-fire agreement which was signed by the leaders of the six states party to the conflict - but not by the Congolese rebel groups. The agreement provided for the cessation of hostilities within 24 hours of signature, and for the establishment within one week of a Joint Military Commission (JMC) with the purpose of overseeing the implementation of the agreement until such a time as a UN peacekeeping force could be deployed. The accord also provided for the initiation of an inter-Congolese dialogue on the political future of the DRC.6

Although very much a ‘home-grown’ agreement and the product of a regional peacemaking process, the Lusaka cease-fire accord did place a heavy burden of expectancy on a UN peacekeeping force. As understood by the UN Secretary-General, the suggested mandate of such a force would include the following tasks:7

working with the JMC and the OAU in the implementation of the agreement;



observing and monitoring the cessation of hostilities;



investigating violations of the cease-fire agreement and taking the necessary measures to ensure compliance;



supervising the disengagement of forces as stipulated in the agreement;



supervising the redeployment of forces to defensive positions in conflict zones in accordance with
the agreement;



providing and maintaining humanitarian assistance to and protecting displaced persons,
refugees and other affected persons;



keeping the parties to the cease-fire agreement informed of its peacekeeping operations;



collecting weapons from civilians and ensuring that the weapons which are collected, are properly accounted for and adequately secured;



scheduling and supervising the withdrawal of all foreign forces in collaboration with the JMC and the OAU; and



verifying all information, data and activities relating to the military forces of the parties.

The cease-fire agreement also envisages a number of ‘peace enforcement’ operations, including:

the tracking down and disarming of armed groups;8


screening mass killers, perpetrators of crimes against humanity and other war criminals; and


handing over suspected genocidaires to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

Implicitly (and naively), these tasks would also have to be carried out by UN peace keepers. Even if the shaky Lusaka consent to the cease-fire by the six states party to the conflict, the MLC and the RCD factions were to hold firm, the fact that the ‘armed groups’ are not party to the agreement means that there is a serious challenge to the UN peacekeeping principle of consent.

But no peace keepers could deploy unless the MLC and RCD rebels signed the Lusaka accord. South Africa became intensively engaged in the process of persuading the rebel movements to get on board. These efforts bore partial fruit on 1 August 1999, when Jean-Pierre Bemba became the first of the Congolese rebel leaders to sign the peace accord on behalf of the MLC. On 31 August 1999, the RCD eventually signed the cease-fire accord, after a compromise agreement had been brokered under which all fifty founding members signed the document on the RCD’s behalf.

The problem with this inventive diplomacy is that the Lusaka agreement allowed for each signatory - then envisaged to be the states involved plus the RCD and the MLC - to nominate two members each to the JMC. Within hours of the RCD signatures, disagreements arose between the Goma and Kisangani factions, with both insisting on representation on the JMC.9 Even with the necessary signatures on paper, diplomatic activity should not be mistaken for actual achievement. Chiluba himself cautioned that the signing would not automatically bring peace to the DRC and called on the UN Security Council to approve the deployment of a peacekeeping force "with a mandate commensurate to the task at hand."10

UN DEPLOYMENT

The cease-fire was due to commence within 24 hours of the signing of the agreement (commonly interpreted as 31 August 1999, when the RCD signed). The JMC, representing all the signatories, was established under the cease-fire agreement to regulate and monitor the cessation of hostilities until the deployment of UN and OAU military observers. It was also to be responsible, together with the military observers, for peacekeeping functions until the deployment of a UN force. The establishment of the JMC was long delayed by negotiations over the appointment of a chairperson, wrangles about RCD representation and procedural issues, as well as financing and logistic problems. Based in Lusaka, the JMC comprises two members each from the belligerent parties, including the MLC and both of the RCD factions, as well as ‘neutral’ observers from Zambia and representatives of the UN and OAU.

On 15 July 1999, five days after the states party to the conflict signed the Lusaka agreement, the Secretary-General recommended to the Security Council that the UN side of the implementation of the cease-fire agreement should be dealt with in three phases:

the deployment of unarmed military liaison officers to the capitals of the signatories and, if the security situation permits, to the rear headquarters of the rebel groups;



the deployment of up to 500 military observers inside the DRC; and



the deployment of a peacekeeping force.11

Annan specifically "strongly recommended" that the Security Council immediately authorise the deployment of ninety military personnel to the DRC. On 6 August 1999, the Security Council duly approved the deployment of up to ninety military liaison officers to the capitals of the parties to the agreement. Their tasks, as mandated by Security Council Resolution 1258, included the following:12

to establish contacts and maintain liaison with the JMC and all parties to the agreement;



to assist the JMC and the parties in developing modalities for the implementation of the agreement;



to provide technical assistance, as requested, to the JMC;



to provide information to the Secretary-General regarding the situation on the ground, and to assist in refining a concept of operations for a possible further role of the UN in the implementation of the agreement once it is signed by all parties; and



to secure guarantees of co-operation and assurances of security from the parties for the
possible deployment in-country of military observers.

The mission set up its advance headquarters in Kinshasa and deployed military liaison officers in Kinshasa, Kigali, Kampala, Harare and Windhoek. Liaison officers were also sent to Bujumbura, to Lusaka as the provisional seat of the JMC, and to the OAU headquarters in Addis Ababa. By January 2000, small teams of up to four military liaison officers had managed to deploy to no more than nine locations in the DRC: Kinshasa, Kananga, Kindu, Goma, Boende, Lisala, Gemena, Gbodolite and Isiro.

The ability of the military liaison officers and the technical assessment team to provide the Secretary-General with an accurate appraisal of the modalities for further UN deployment has thus been severely limited. The UN team’s capacity to observe the cease-fire, help the JMC to investigate cease-fire violations, make a security assessment of the country and determine the present and future locations of combatants’ positions, would require it to deploy throughout the country and at the ill-defined battle fronts. The mission has not been able to deploy effectively, and has been prevented from executing its mandate as a result of inadequate security guarantees from the DRC government and differences with Kinshasa on the need for it to deploy observers in government-held areas.

Since the end of August 1999, there have been continuous claims and counterclaims of cease-fire violations by both sides, including tank and artillery attacks, ground attacks with support from helicopter gunships, aerial bombing raids, attacks on civilians, territorial advances, troop deployments, blockades, and reinforcements within and across borders. The alleged cease-fire violations have been along and behind the frontlines and geographically widespread, including the provinces of Shaba, Kasai Occidental, Kasai Oriental, Equateur and Kivu (see the appendix for a sample list of alleged violations since September 1999). It is interesting to note that almost all of the alleged violations involve the signatories to the Lusaka agreement, with two alleged attacks by Mai-Mai militia being the exception.

Suffice it to say that every single stipulation of the key Article I of the Lusaka agreement has been repeatedly abrogated, and that it is predominantly the signatories themselves (and not the armed groups that are to be the object of UN peace enforcement) that are at fault.13 Yet, the military liaison officers have apparently been unable to verify and report accurately on most of the alleged violations. When reporting on the security situation in the DRC, the Secretary-General has thus been forced to admit that "information could not be confirmed", and to use phraseology such as "strongly suggest", "apparently on suspicion" and "allegedly."14

Nevertheless, on 30 November 1999, the Security Council unanimously voted to adopt Resolution 1279, which requested the Secretary-General, with immediate effect, to take the necessary administrative steps to equip up to 500 UN military observers, with a view to facilitate future rapid UN deployments as authorised by the Council. The UN Observer Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) is also to include a multidisciplinary staff trained in the fields of human rights, humanitarian affairs, public information, medical support, child protection and political affairs, as well as administrative support personnel who will assist the Special Representative for the Democratic Republic of Congo until 1 March 2000.15

The Council also stressed that the phased deployment of UN military observers, with the necessary support and protection elements in the DRC, will be subject to its further decision. The Council expressed its intention to take such a decision promptly on the basis of further recommendations by the Secretary-General, taking into account the findings of the technical assessment team.16

By January 2000, despite a deteriorating security situation in the Congo, Annan was obviously under pressure to make good his intention to "... revert to the Security Council with detailed proposals for the deployment of a peacekeeping mission, including its mandate and concept of operations, once [he has] carefully reviewed the situation on the ground in the light of MONUC’s reports."17 Indeed, during the 24 January Council meeting on the DRC, there were strident calls by just about every African leader present for the deployment of a ‘full-fledged UN peacekeeping mission’ without any further delay. In addition to the demand for a sizeable force, no less than six countries called for such a force to be established under Chapter VII of the UN Charter. These were the DRC, Mozambique (with Chissano also speaking in his capacity as chairperson of SADC), Zimbabwe (with Mugabe also talking on behalf of SADC), Uganda, Rwanda and Namibia.18

The Secretary-General was able to refer to his latest report (17 January 2000) which urges the Security Council to authorise a considerable expansion of the MONUC mission - from the present 77 military liaison officers to 5 537 military observers and peace keepers. Annan said the proposal was based on the assumption that the parties to the conflict would respect the Lusaka peace accord and the relevant Security Council resolutions. He added that, even with the willingness of the parties to provide security for MONUC personnel, the general level of insecurity, the difficult terrain and the degraded infrastructure in the DRC would not allow the deployment of the additional 500 observers and civilian staff envisaged in Resolution 1279 (November 1999) without the simultaneous deployment of formed units of soldiers to protect the latter and to ‘facilitate’ their activities.

The force would consist (in addition to the 500 military observers) of four reinforced infantry battalions numbering a total of 3 400 troops, to be located near the current or potential areas of operation of the military observers and civilian personnel - identified provisionally as Mbandaka in the north, Mbuji Mayi in the south, Kisangani in the east, and a point yet to be determined in the south-east. To patrol and provide transport on the inland waterways, two marine companies of 150 troops and four boats each are also requested. The Secretary-General also highlighted the need for very substantial aviation assets, including helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft. The rest of the numbers are made up of headquarters staff and medical personnel.

According to the report, the military tasks of the expanded MONUC force would include military liaison, monitoring the cessation of hostilities, investigating cease-fire violations and verifying the disengagement of the various forces. Annan stressed that the troops "... would not serve as an interposition force nor would they be expected to extract military observers of civilian personnel by force. They would not have the capacity to protect civilian personnel from armed attack." Additional tasks - including the facilitation of the eventual disarmament and demobilisation of armed groups and the monitoring and verifying of the withdrawal of foreign forces - will require the approval of the Council for a larger operation.19

Basically, the envisaged concept of operations is the same as that advocated for the 500 military observers according to the November 1999 resolution on creating MONUC - except that it recognises that these observers cannot survive in a hostile environment without the support of formed infantry units. Obviously, the new proposal will also have a higher price tag and will place even more UN personnel at risk.

Nevertheless, on 26 January, the UN Security Council said that it would act promptly along the lines recommended by the Secretary-General in his (17 January) report to the Council. Richard Holbrooke said the Council would consider, "at the appropriate" time, preparations for an additional phase of UN deployment and further action in the DRC. The Council president also stressed the "absolute need" for security and access for UN personnel deployed in support of the Lusaka process.20

AT SIXES AND SEVENS AGAIN

Given the record of cease-fire violations since September 1999, and the inability to provide an accurate mission assessment from the ground, any security guarantees provided by the Lusaka signatories must be tentative at best. It also remains to be seen whether the Security Council is satisfied with the messages it received from several of these signatories at the meeting on 24 January - particularly the notion articulated by several of these leaders that, by their very attendance of the meeting, they had demonstrated their commitment to the Lusaka agreement and their determination to implement it.

However, the permanent Council member most likely to veto an expansion of the MONUC operation, the US, would be hard pressed to do so after sponsoring the ‘Month of Africa’. Indeed, the BBC reported on 9 February 2000 that the US administration had tabled a Council resolution in support of Annan’s 17 January proposals, and that Richard Holbrooke was due in Washington to explain the resolution to Congress (referred to by some as the 16th member of the Security Council). Moreover, somewhat of a precedent was set when the Council voted unanimously, on 7 February 1999, to approve the Secretary-General’s plans for strengthening the UNAMSIL mission in Sierra Leone. Not only has the maximum authorised strength been increased from 6 000 to 11 000, but the mission now enjoys an expanded mandate under Chapter VII of the UN Charter.21 It is likely that a resolution authorising the expansion of MONUC, as requested by the Secretary-General, will soon be formulated.

This approach of minimising risks though an incremental UN deployment to the DRC is perhaps understandable, given the fragile nature of the Lusaka accord and an approach that relies entirely on consent and voluntary compliance by the signatory parties with the terms of the accord and related Security Council resolutions. As Annan puts it, "the political context, as well as the political, military and logistical constraints, justify a step-by-step approach adapted to the situation." On the other hand, the worst way to try and cross a chasm is in small steps.

The incremental approach flies in the face of just about every recommendation of a number of ‘lessons learned’ seminars that were conducted in the wake of the failed UN missions in Somalia and Rwanda. The most fundamental lesson to emerge from these endeavours is that there must be a clear and achievable mandate backed by sufficient means for its execution. This clearly was not the case with the military liaison officers’ deployment, and even the proposed 500 military observers, with an expanded mandate, will be hard pressed to accomplish much more than their predecessors.

The new deployment is basically conceived as an observer mission with formed units in support. The formed units of the expanded MONUC force are not expected to make a direct contribution to the military observers’ capacity to monitor and report accurately on troop disengagement and cease-fire violations. On the other hand, the force level of over 5 000 will mean that MONUC will quite reasonably be mistaken for a peacekeeping operation, and will thus be extremely vulnerable to ‘mission creep’ and/or negative media reporting when it is unable to react to violations of the Lusaka accord. Annan has rightly warned that "the deployment of a MONUC peacekeeping operation will ... create inflated expectations that might well be unrealistic."22 That these expectations already exist, is evident in the calls of most of the states party to the conflict for the rapid deployment of a significant UN force with a Chapter VII mandate.

The proposed concept of operations for MONUC also ignores the lessons learned by the UN and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) in the former Yugoslavia - lessons that have been incorporated into NATO doctrine for peace support operations. The latter emphasises the fact that, if a peace operation is to be effective, it must be credible and perceived as such. The credibility of the operation is, in turn, a reflection of the parties’ assessment of the force’s capability to accomplish the mission. At this stage, it is apparent that the parties to the conflict in the DRC have a much higher expectation of UN capabilities than would be provided for in the proposed expansion of MONUC.

The consensus on peace support operation doctrine is that a peace support force must demonstrate its effectiveness with the initial deployment to the mission area. It must be employed with a sound concept of operations and adequate rules of engagement to guarantee mission success, even in the face of attempts by the parties either to gain an advantage or to undermine the mission. Should the level of consent be uncertain, and the potential for opposition exist, it would be prudent to deploy a peace enforcement force capable of enforcing compliance and promoting consent from the outset. Similarly, a study by Donald Daniel and Brad Hayes, which examines several peace support operations over the past nine years that ‘exemplify success’, concludes that:

"The common thread throughout these examples is the quick deployment of robust forces which, possibly through shock effect, implicitly if not explicitly deliver the message that they mean business."23

NATO’s conceptual model for distinguishing between peacekeeping, peace enforcement and war is illustrated below (see Figure 1).

ENDNOTES

This is an edited version of a paper with the same title presented at an ISS seminar on The recent UN focus on conflict resolution in Africa, 10 February 2000. It is published in support of Training for Peace, a project sponsored by Norway and executed by the ISS in partnership with the Norwegian Institute for International Affairs (NUPI) and the African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Conflict (ACCORD).

IRIN Interview with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, New York, 1 February 2000.



Ibid.



B Crossette, UN faces big challenge in any Congo peacekeeping mission, New York Times, 31 January 2000.



In her address to the Security Council meeting on the DRC on 24 January 2000.



United Nations Security Council, Resolution 1234, S/RES/1234 (1999), adopted by the Security Council at its 3993rd meeting, on 9 April 1999.



The main provisions of the agreement included:

• the immediate cessation of hostilities;

• the establishment of the JMC, comprising the belligerent parties under a neutral chairperson appointed by the OAU, to investigate cease-fire violations, establish mechanisms to disarm identified militias and monitor the withdrawal of foreign troops according to an agreed schedule;

• the deployment of an ‘appropriate’ (peacekeeping and peace enforcement) UN mission tasked with disarming the armed groups, collecting weapons from civilians and providing humanitarian assistance and protection to vulnerable populations; and

• initiating an ‘inter-Congolese dialogue’ intended to lead to "a new political dispensation in the DRC."



United Nations, Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Preliminary Deployment in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, S/1999/790, New York, 15 July 1999.



The ‘armed groups’ identified, included Rwandan Interahamwe militia and the former Rwandan government forces (FAR); Congolese Mayi-Mayi militias; the Allied Democratic Front (ADF), the Uganda National Rescue Front II, the West Nile Bank Front and the Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda; the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA); and the Burundian Forces pour la défense de la démocratie (FDD).



Democratic Republic of Congo: UN welcomes rebel signing of peace accord, IRIN-CEA Update No. 748 for Central and Eastern Africa, 2 September 1999.



SABC, 2 September 1999.



S/1999/790, op cit.



UN Security Council press release, SC/6711, 6 August 1999.



According to Article I, the parties agree to a cease-fire among all their forces in the DRC, meaning the effective cessation of hostilities, military movements and reinforcement, as well as hostile actions, including hostile propaganda within 24 hours of signing the cease-fire agreement. Specifically, Article I states that the cease-fire shall entail the cessation of:

• all air, land and sea attacks, as well as actions of sabotage;

• attempts to occupy new ground positions and the movement of military forces and resources from one area to another, without prior agreement between the parties;

• all acts of violence against the civilian population by respecting and protecting human rights;

• supplies of ammunition and weaponry and other war-related stores to the field; and

• any other actions that may impede the normal evolution of the cease-fire process.



See, for example, UN Security Council, Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organisation Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, S/2000/30, 17 January 2000, paragraphs 10 and 12.



UN Security Council press release, SC/6766, 30 November 1999.



Ibid.



S/1999/790, op cit.



UN Security Council press release, Seven African heads of state address Security Council in
day-long meeting on Democratic Republic of Congo, SC/6789, 24 January 2000.



S/1999/790, op cit, paragraph 67.



UN Security Council, Statement by the president of the Security Council, SPRST/2000/2, 26 January 2000.



Reuters, 7 February 2000.



S/2000/30, op cit, paragraph 85.



D C F Daniel & B C Hayes, Securing observance of UN mandates through the employment of military forces, US Naval War College, Newport, RI, 1995. UNITAF, Operation Turquoise, Provide Comfort and Uphold Democracy are cited as operations that succeeded in successfully inducing co-operation from belligerents.



S/2000/30, op cit, paragraph 52

APPENDIX

DRC CEASE-FIRE VIOLATIONS*

Key to abbreviations

DRC: Democratic Republic of Congo
FAC: Congolese Armed Forces
JMC: Joint Military Commission
MISNA: Catholic Missionary News Agency
MLC: Movement for the Liberation of Congo
RCD: Rally for Congolese Democracy

List prepared by the ISS Africa Early Warning Programme. It is not comprehensive, but is illustrative of the nature and extent of alleged violations of the Lusaka cease-fire agreement.