CAR Central African Republic: Fragile, failed and forlorn

[SWJ Blog]

The Central African Republic: $2.2 Billion Won’t Buy Peace

Read the full post and make any comments at the SWJ Blog.

[davidbfpo]

A rare BBC report on the CAR and the problems facing the UN peacekeepers, known as MINUSCA; with the faraway setting in Washington DC:

Welcome to the world of the warlords. We may be seeing a lot more of them if President Trump keeps his promise to scale back American support for UN peacekeeping. Currently the US supplies 28.57% of the total budget for UN deployments.

I was not aware MINUSCA had attack helicopters:

The fact that UN attack helicopters were deployed at the weekend proves this. Not only in the CAR, but in trouble spots across the globe there will be warlords and beleaguered civilians watching what happens next.

Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-38967461

Since this conflict is often along Christian -v- Muslim lines, would President Trump remove funding?

[davidbfpo]

From MSF a report on the deterioration in CAR, in the countryside and in places previously unaffected:

Last year, CAR had the second highest number of violent incidents in the world – second only to Syria

It appears few wish to help:

The United Nations estimates that more than two million people, almost half of the country’s inhabitants, depend on foreign aid. Around US$400 million is required: they haven't even been able to raise 13 percent of this figure.

Link:https://www.msf.org.uk/article/car-p...survival-mode?

There is a BBC News report from March 2015 (6 mins), by Fergal Keane, which illustrates how difficult the CAR is - for the UN peacekeepers:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybHcjMcadTc

[davidbfpo]

Crikey SWJ has an article on CAR! It is a brief overview. See:http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art...al-african-rep

The second article via an academic opinion website reminds the reader how desperate the CAR is:

It has a population of 4.6 million people. Since 2013, the country has been embroiled in a civil war that has left half the population in urgent need of humanitarian assistance, and displaced nearly 1 million people. Half of those have sought refuge in neighbouring countries.

Link:https://theconversation.com/for-the-central-african-republic-there-will-be-no-peace-without-justice-81403?

[davidbfpo]

This article appeared in the NYT on March 22nd and has now appeared on the SWJ Blog (which is no longer indexed on the Forum). The article apparently aroused some criticism.
Link to original NY column: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/23/opinion/sunday/central-african-republic-conflict.html? and SWJ Blog's commentary:http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art...rican-republic

[davidbfpo]

After the reporting three Russian investigative reporters had been ambushed and killed there have been a few short reports, this one appears to be far better: 'Murdered Russian Journalists In Africa Were Onto Something Dangerous for Putin; They were on the trail of mercenaries with close ties to the Kremlin in a war-torn country full of diamonds and gold'
Link:https://www.thedailybeast.com/murder...ous-for-putin?