- Last month, a classified UN report prompted Secretary
General Kofi Annan to admit that U.N. peacekeepers and staff have sexually
abused or exploited war refugees in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The
worst of the 150 or so allegations of misconduct--some of them captured
on videotape--include pedophilia, rape, and prostitution. While a U.N.
investigation into the scandal continues, the organization has just suspended
two more peacekeepers in neighboring Burundi over similar charges. The
revelations come three years after another U.N. report found "widespread"
evidence of sexual abuse of West African refugees.
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- "The issue with the U.N. is that peacekeeping operations
unfortunately seem to be doing the same thing that other militaries do,"
Gita Sahgal of Amnesty International told the Christian Science Monitor.
"Even the guardians have to be guarded." That's not far off the
mark. Various U.N. reports and interviews with humanitarian groups suggest
that international peacekeeping missions are creating a predatory sexual
culture among vulnerable refugees--from relief workers who demand sexual
favors in exchange for food to U.N. troops who rape women at gunpoint.
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- Allegations of sexual abuse or misconduct by U.N. staff
stretch back at least a decade, to operations in Kosovo, Sierra Leone,
Liberia, and Guinea. A 2001 report, released by the U.N. High Commissioner
for Refugees (UNHCR) and Save the Children, found that sexual violence
against refugees in West Africa was endemic (though some of its findings
were denied by a subsequent U.N. team). A year later a coalition of religious
organizations sent a letter to Secretary of State Colin Powell urging
the United States to send more human rights monitors into Congo. The U.N.
then introduced a "code of conduct" to help prevent future abuses,
including prohibitions against sexual activity between staff and children
and the exchange of money or food for sex.
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- It now appears, however, that little has changed on the
ground. The U.N. Mission in Congo (MONUC) employs about 10,800 peacekeepers
from 50 countries, in addition to many civilian staff. Yet there is no
independent oversight of U.N. operations in its refugee camps. For that
matter, none of the international agencies in the country has U.N. authority
to protect the civil rights of internal refugees. Almost a year after the
MONUC office in Kindu sent a memo in August 2003 to its headquarters in
Kinshasa, detailing suspicions of sexual exploitation, the London Independent
discovered action still hadn't been taken.
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- "We recognize that sexual exploitation and abuse
is a problem in some missions," said Jane Holl Lute, a U.N. assistant
secretary general, at a recent press conference. "It's obvious that
the measures we've had in place have not been adequate." Relief organizations
and human rights groups agree, describing as "urgent" the need
to protect young girls from U.N. militia and staff. As Patrick Barbier,
of Doctors Without Borders, told one newspaper: "It is clear that
the necessary steps to protect the displaced population from violence and
sexual exploitation have not been followed."
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- Indeed, the international operation in Bunia, home to
about 16,000 refugees, threatens to become another monument to U.N. paralysis
and failure. Investigators describe a "significant, widespread and
ongoing" pattern of abuse at the camp--an astonishing conclusion given
that many women are afraid to report sexual violence against them. At least
one senior official in charge of security in Bunia is implicated in the
scandal, and U.N. peacekeepers allegedly have threatened investigators
with retaliation. According to the Economist, a U.N. probe is even considering
the possibility that MONUC has been infiltrated by "organized pedophiles
who recruit their friends."
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- The U.N. abuses are especially grievous in Congo, where
sexual violence against women and children has been a weapon of war employed
by most of the armies involved in the six-year-old conflict. Called "Africa's
world war," it has involved militias from Angola, Namibia, Zimbabwe,
Uganda, Rwanda, and Congo. Despite a peace agreement reached in 2002, the
fighting continues: According to the International Rescue Committee, more
than 31,000 civilians are dying a month from violence, disease, and famine;
tens of thousands remain in refugee camps, mostly women and children. In
Bunia alone, a U.N. Children's Fund (UNICEF) program has treated 2,000
victims of sexual violence in recent months.
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- Kofi Annan has insisted on "zero tolerance"
of sexual exploitation by peacekeepers, but U.N. rules apply only to U.N.
employees; military personnel fall under the jurisdiction of their own
governments. Only a few peacekeepers have been deported, and no U.N. staff
have been charged with criminal activity.
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- That's prompting tough talk from some U.S. officials
about American assistance for U.N. peacekeeping missions. The United States
will give $490 million next year to support about 62,000 military personnel
and civilian police serving in 16 U.N. operations around the world. "Until
the U.N. is willing to take decisive action and take responsibility for
these acts, we should look seriously at the funding portion of the peace-keeping
operations," says a foreign policy aide to Kansas Republican Sam Brownback,
who serves on the Senate Appropriations Committee. "I don't know any
other way to force Annan to pay attention."
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- This latest U.N. episode, piled on top of the ongoing
Oil for Food scandal in Iraq, may help focus the mind. The sexual abuses
committed, or ignored, by U.N. personnel violate the institution's Convention
on the Rights of the Child, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms
of Discrimination Against Women, and the principles enshrined in the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights. A 2002 U.N. report characterized the sexual
exploitation issue as "a betrayal of trust as well as a catastrophic
failure of protection."
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- Peacekeepers as predators? It's difficult to see how
another U.N. probe, proclamation, or committee report could reverse that
perception anytime soon.
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- Joseph Loconte is the William E. Simon Fellow in Religion
at the Heritage Foundation and editor of The End of Illusions: Religious
Leaders Confront Hitler's Gathering Storm.
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- http://www.weeklystandard.com/
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