SA ready to take fight to rebels

SANDF members perform drills. File photo: Paballo Thekiso

SANDF members perform drills. File photo: Paballo Thekiso

Published Jan 28, 2015

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Addis Ababa - South Africa was ready to go into battle against the FDLR rebels in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo and against other forces destabilising the continent, Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, the Minister of International Relations and Co-operation, said at the AU in Addis Ababa on Tuesday.

She said it was just a matter of time before the South African military and its allies in the UN’s Force Intervention Brigade chose the right moment to attack the rebels.

And South Africa was ready to respond to calls for help by other African countries by deploying its battalion in the AU’s African Capacity for Immediate Response to Crises (ACIRC) – a temporary response force capable of dealing with continental crises.

Nkoana-Mashabane said the AU’s peace and security council and the Southern African Development Community would meet this week to discuss the various security crises in Africa.

These include the many armed rebellions in the eastern DRC, the growing Boko Haram insurgency in northern Nigeria, which is spilling over into neighbouring countries, the internecine fighting in South Sudan, and the civil war in Libya.

Neutralise

But she insisted the leaders would not be meeting to give the final political go-ahead for military action against the FDLR, saying that a mandate had been given to the force more than a year ago to “neutralise negative forces” in eastern DRC.

The UN peacekeepers had since gone into operation against other rebel groups, but had not done so against the FDLR because it had agreed to surrender. But when it failed to meet a six-month deadline to surrender by January 2, military action became inevitable.

The minister insisted that the fear of hurting civilians was not an obstacle to action against the rebel group. Many analysts have warned the rebels will use civilians as human shields because they are deeply embedded in the population.

But Nkoana-Mashabane said: “The military know how to separate combatants from non-combatants.”

The attack against FDLR could begin any time, she said – “while we are sitting here… or it can happen today or tomorrow”.

On ACIRC, she said South Africa’s battalion was ready and the force as a whole was “almost done with planning” and just needed a theatre for military exercises.

She dismissed concerns that regional jealousies prevented the force from deploying.

AU sources have said, though, that the obstacles to military action by the UN brigade and ACIRC were not just military but also political. - Independent Foreign Service

The Mercury

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