KINSHASA, Congo — The UN peacekeeping mission in Congo, which helped fight rebels for more than two decades before being asked to leave by the Congolese government, will complete its withdrawal from the Central African country by the end of 2024, the mission said on Saturday.
A three-phase withdrawal of the 15,000 troops will begin in South Kivu province, where at least 2,000 security personnel will leave in the first phase by the end of April, said Bintou Keita, head of the mission known as MONUSCO. forces in the provinces of North Kivu and Ituri will also leave.
“After 25 years of presence, MONUSCO will permanently leave the DRC by the end of 2024,” Keita said at a media briefing in the Congolese capital Kinshasa. The end of the mission will not be “the end of the United Nations.” in the country, she added.
The UN and Congolese officials worked together to draw up a withdrawal plan for “a progressive, responsible, honorable and exemplary withdrawal from MONUSCO,” Congolese Foreign Minister Christophe Lutundula said. Modalities have also been established for “the gradual transfer of tasks from MONUSCO to the Congolese government,” Lutundula added.
The MONUSCO force arrived in Congo in 2010 after taking over from a previous UN peacekeeping mission to protect civilians and humanitarian personnel and to support the Congolese government in its stabilization and peace consolidation efforts.
Frustrated Congolese, however, say no one is protecting them from rebel attacks, leading to protests against the UN mission and others that have sometimes turned deadly.
Over the course of its existence, eastern Congo has continued to be plagued by more than 120 armed groups seeking a share of the region’s resources, such as gold, and trying to protect their communities, some of which are quietly supported by Congo’s neighboring countries. The violence has been caused by rampant mass killings and has displaced nearly seven million people.
The Congolese government – which has just been re-elected after a controversial vote – has asked the UN mission to leave the country, after claiming that security cooperation “has proven its limits in a context of permanent war, without achieving the desired peace in eastern Congo has recovered. .” The government has also ordered an East African regional force, deployed last year to help end the fighting, to leave the country for similar reasons.