Editor,

RE: "CAR: How sexual misconduct of UN peacekeepers contravened its mandate” (The New Times, August 17).

Some clarifications are in order.

1. The French soldiers in the CAR accused of sexually raping young children were part of a French military contingent, the Sangaris, and not part of the UN peacekeeping operation, though the operations are obviously linked.

2. Sexual misconduct by forces serving under the UN in so-called peacekeeping operations goes beyond sexual exploitation, using bribery or other inducements to get sexual favours from vulnerable women or children.

Cases of forced rape with extreme violence have been documented in the DR Congo and other places.

See, for instance, the report by Dr. Victoria Fontan of the UN's own University for Peace of two little Congolese sisters (elder one 12 years old and the younger eleven) in which the older sister was violently raped by three Uruguayan "peacekeepers" and beaten very badly while the youngest was being beaten up by the Uruguayans' FARDC accomplices.

The older girl conceived from that violent gang-rape and had a miscarriage, some few months later.

We don't know of any punishment against the concerned soldiers by Hervé Ladsous, misnamed UN Peacekeeping Department.

3. UN forces are not empowered to use force only in self-defence. As we saw recently against the M23, they can and have gone on the offensive against parties the "Big Powers” in the Security Council want to eliminate. In that case, even the fig leaf term "peacekeeping” is misleading.

These are war-making forces, just like any other.

Mwene Kalinda