Opinion
What else must happen in Congo before the EU really helps?
By Elise Ford
Fighting in eastern Congo continues to put the lives of thousands at risk. The need for an urgent response only grows. But Europe shamefully continues to fail to take the kind of action that is most needed - sending in a rapid-response military mission.
France, currently sitting at the EU's helm, has prioritised strengthening Europe's role as a world leader in protecting civilians. The EU's standby forces, known as battlegroups - a key element of the EU's crisis management ambitions - have been designed for rapid deployment in exactly the kind of crisis we are currently seeing in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
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Battlegroups have been fully operational for almost two years but they have never been used. A rapid injection of European troops, with a clear mandate to stabilise the situation, deter further fighting, and support civilian protection until additional UN peacekeeping troops (as part of the MONUC mission) arrive, could make a real difference in the lives of millions of Congolese and show the world that Europe is serious about living up to its "responsibility to protect."
It could help prevent a repeat of last week's deliberate targeting of civilians in the town of Kiwanja - attacks which the UN has described as war crimes. It could offer much-needed security in a context in which human rights groups are reporting civilian executions, huge numbers of rapes and recruitment of child soldiers. Moreover, a quarter of a million people have been forced from their homes since August, many of them fleeing for the second or third time.
However, it appears that the EU can't generate the political will to engage their forces to respond to the most pressing humanitarian crises. Just after the latest crisis broke, the French and British foreign ministers went to the region and came back with very clear calls for the urgent military reinforcement of MONUC.
MONUC is overstretched, and desperately in need of assistance. But international calls for it to better "redeploy" its forces, imperil the populations in other volatile zones such as Ituri. It is also true that MONUC needs some serious improvements in its leadership and the way it implements its mandate to protect civilians. But there are things that need to be done immediately if we are serious about the human lives at stake.
A European battlegroup, which could be on the ground within a matter of weeks, could quickly respond to the increasingly pressing protection and security needs of the Congolese people. In comparison, many analysts believe that additional MONUC "reinforcements," which the UN security council has agreed to, will take months to arrive.
But instead of acknowledging what is really needed on the ground, the EU is discussing ineffective options, such as a recent move to provide humanitarian "airlifts" of food to Goma. At the moment, food stocks in Goma are not the problem - it is the rampant insecurity and continued fighting throughout North Kivu that make access difficult and threatens people's lives. Europe should continue to provide desperately needed humanitarian assistance for as long as it is needed, but should recognise that this is only a band-aid for some as long as intense fighting prevents aid workers from reaching all those that need their help.
Many Congolese that Oxfam has worked with on the ground have told us that they feel that like they are the living dead, and that their lives have no value. The world needs to show them that that is not true, and the EU has the opportunity right now to do this by providing immediate additional support to the UN peacekeepers through the deployment of a battle-group.
In the long run, extra peacekeepers won't resolve the political causes of this conflict. The EU must unify its diplomatic efforts to address the underlying causes of a conflict which has claimed 5.4 million lives in the last 10 years and it must support efforts to achieve a negotiated ceasefire. But in the short-run, EU forces are imperative in order to stabilise the situation, deter further fighting, protect the population and create an opening for political dialogue. The world must not look away from Congo as it has done so many times before.
Elise Ford is Oxfam's EU humanitarian policy advisor in Brussels
Disclaimer
The views expressed in this opinion piece are the author's, not those of EUobserver.