Somalia: UN holds back troops

14 August 2007
News 24

New York - The United Nations Security Council will hold back on sending forces to keep the peace in war-scarred Somalia, say diplomats, but is looking to boost support for African peacekeepers there.
Britain was due this week to submit a draft resolution approving a six-month extension of the current African Union peacekeeping force, Amisom, said UN diplomats after talks with Somalia.
Pascal Gayama, Congo's ambassador to the UN, who was chairperson of the Security Council in August, said: "The objective is to adopt a resolution enabling the UN to be much more present in Somalia.
"In Somalia, we have to move from unilateralism ... to multilateral support in a much more coherent and heavy way. It will not be proper to give the impression that the international community is not interested in Somalia."
The east African country was in a precarious state after its fragile government with the help of the Ethiopian military seven months ago fought off a powerful Islamist movement that had seized the capital, Mogadishu.
UN may take over in Somalia
That conflict capped 16 years of civil unrest since the ousting of the former dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in a coup in 1991.
Amison had been deployed in the country since March, but was under-resourced, with only some 1 700 Ugandan soldiers struggling amid bloody clashes between Islamist insurgents and Ethiopian forces.
The AU wanted the UN to take over in Somalia when its mandate runs out at the end of 2007. One western diplomat said there was reluctance at this within the international body, which lost 151 of its blue helmet forces during an earlier peacekeeping mission in the 1990s.
Liu Zhenmin, China's deputy permanent UN representative, said: "For the moment, we are not prepared to take over ... in view of the difficulties Amisom is facing.
"Maybe the Security Council will ask the secretary-general to give us a plan for support to Amisom ... something between deployment and simply standing by."
France's new ambassador to the UN, Jean-Maurice Ripert, said that France believed "the question of UN involvement in Somalia must remain open".
According to the UN, there were reports of civilians getting caught in the cross-fire and at least 400 000 people were internally displaced there.
Gayama said: "Somalia is one of the most difficult among all the conflict situations prevailing in the world and we are really pushing the Security Council" on the issue.