Global Policy Forum

By Mark Doyle

UN investigators are due to visit the Democratic Republic of Congo with a tough new mandate to look into violations of the arms embargo.

The UN Security Council imposed an arms embargo on DR Congo two years ago and has a peacekeeping force on the ground. But the illegal exploitation of minerals such as gold and diamonds still funds arms flows to militias. The investigators say they now have legal powers that will allow them to step up searches.They will be able to conduct inspections of land and airspace for suspected violators of the embargo, as well as monitoring bank accounts. Kathi Austin, one of the group heading for DR Congo, says sanctions will be imposed on individuals. "According to the last Security Council resolution, they will be applying targeted sanctions to those violators, so anyone caught red-handed, or with a paper trail of having violated the arms embargo will be subject possibly to a travel ban or assets freeze," she says.

Sanctions like these can be very effective. But DR Congo has enormously long and extremely porous borders. As if that did not make enforcing the UN embargo difficult enough, DR Congo is also surrounded by countries that routinely break the UN ban by trading in illegal minerals and even backing militia groups. The UN hopes that the new investigating powers it has could counter some of these negative factors by encouraging neighbouring countries to co-operate with the arms embargo.

Earlier this year, the UN's investigators in DR Congo were accused by a consultant working with them of publishing false information. However, following an examination of these allegations, the Security Council said it was fully satisfied with the investigators' explanations and re-affirmed its full support for their work. The Security Council encouraged the investigators - who are known in UN parlance as a "group of experts" - to continue to observe the highest standards in conducting their work.

FAIR USE NOTICE: This page contains copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Global Policy Forum distributes this material without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. We believe this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in 17 U.S.C íŸ 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond fair use, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.