BURUNDI: United Nations Renews Plea for Action Amid Coup Rumours

By Farhan Haq Reprint | | Print |

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 24 1996 (IPS) - Reports that Burundi’s multi-ethnic coalition government had been overthrown Wednesday have sparked new life into the long-stalled effort to send a U.N. peacekeeping force there.

Despite a continuing lack of support from major Western powers for such a force, U.N. officials renewed their efforts this week to dispatch troops, possibly under the guidelines of Chapter Seven of the U.N. Charter, which authorises the use of force.

Kofi Annan, U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping, said that, if countries can provide logistical support and transport quickly, the United Nations has plans in place to put in several battalions, possibly within a week or two.

“We have to move very quickly, before everything blows up in our faces,” Annan warned.

Already, he noted, Burundi President Sylvestre Ntibantunganya, a member of the Hutu majority, reportedly has been forced to retire and is seeking protection at the U.S. embassy in the cgpital, Bujumbura. The situation, he said, is fluid, and U.N. experts are unsure who controls the government of Burundi now.

Traditionally, a country must approve a U.N. peacekeeping force before it can be sent — and Burundi’s fragile coalition government, comprising members of both the ethnic Hutu majority and Tutsi minority, has been divided on such approval.

Burundi’s U.N. ambassador, Terence Nsanze, leader of a hard- line Tutsi faction, opposes U.N. intervention, as do many members in the Tutsi-led Army.

But Annan said that, if the U.N. Security Council approves Chapter Seven peacekeeping for a potential force, “we don’t need to wait for an invitation.” Under those terms, he said, U.N. troops could be sent even if the forces behind the coup oppose U.N. intervention.

Right now, Annan said, several neighbouring countries have already offered to send battalions to prevent the sort of brutal ethnic massacres that occured in Rwanda two years ago, where perhaps a million people were killed. Three nations — Tanzania, Uganda and Ethiopia — may be able to send some 3,000 soldiers each, he said.

But that may be too little and too late, following both the coup reports and the massacres last weekend of at least 300 Tutsis by Hutu extremist guerrillas in Gitega province. U.N. diplomats confessed it is difficult to determine how stable the situation in Burundi is right now.

Worse, even the latest deterioration has done little to persuade powerful countries — including Burundi’s onetime major ally, France, or the United States — to back a U.N. force. Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali has pleaded for such support in Burundi for two years, to no avail.

At the same time that Annan called anew for peacekeepers in Burundi, the U.N. Security Council issued a lukewarm statement that it would “consider the adoption of further measures” if the situation deteriorates further.

The statement, read by Council President Alain Dejammet of France, mentioned support for “contingency planning for a rapid humanitarian response in the event of widespread violence.” But it did not mention any peacekeeping force, and essentially admonished all sides to settle their differences peacefully.

Annan conceded that sending peacekeepers to Burundi would have been much easier if Western nations took leadership of the effort. But France is ambivalent about the Hutu-Tutsi coalition government, while the United States — in the midst of an election year — is unlikely to consider any involvement in a dangerous military mission.

“I think there’s no prospect whatsoever of American troops participating,” U.S. State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns said Wednesday. Burns said that “it is still within the capability of the Burundian authorities to return calm and stability in the capital,” not outside forces.

But he added that Washington “would be willing to contribute U.S. airlift capacity, logistical support and planning and communications assistance.”

Madeleine Albright, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, added that past experience has helped the United States to learn how to provide such materiel and match it to the needs of other nations’ troops quickly.

Yet past experience indicates a different lesson. In Rwanda in 1994, delays in finding countries willing to support U.N. peacekeeping similarly led to plans where the United States and other richer nations helped to outfit a largely African force. But it took some three months for the new force to enter Rwanda, during which time the rebel Rwandese Patriotic Front (RPF) seized power and halted the massacres.

If Burundi spins out of control, the RPF — now Rwanda’s Army — has indicated it may once again step in, to aid the Tutsi minority. Any such intervention could cause the current crisis to step up tensions throughout central Africa.

Delays in sending troops are not the only problem. The only countries interested in dispatching soldiers to Burundi in the event of widespread killings are all neighbours, who are themselves viewed suspiciously by factions in Burundi.

Ugandan troops could be a target for hostility by Hutu groups who see them as pro-Tutsi, warned one U.N. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni relied on Rwandan Tutsi support in his own rise to power, and allegedly aided the Tutsi-led RPF.

Similarly, Tanzania, which houses many Hutu refugees from Rwanda’s massacres, is viewed warily by some Burundi Army leaders.

Such complexities have bedeviled the prospects of aiding Burundi for months, during which time the ethnic and political tensions have gone from bad to worse. But U.N. officials are adamant that the time to stand by and watch has ended.

“Already, history will judge us very severely for Rwanda,” Annan said. “I don’t think we can repeat that experience in Burundi.”