Global Policy Forum

By Edith M. Lederer

The United States has agreed to the deployment of more than 6,000 U.N. peacekeepers for war-divided Ivory Coast and has asked Congress for approval, Ambassador John Negroponte said Tuesday. Negroponte said the request for congressional authorization was submitted last week. The United States will not contribute any troops to the force, but Congress needs to approve the request because the United States pays 27 percent of all U.N. peacekeeping costs.

Last month, France circulated a draft resolution calling for a 6,240-strong U.N. force and 150 civilian police to replace the 1,000 West African troops and 150 West African gendarmes now in the former French colony. More than 4,000 French troops trying to help keep the peace will remain in the country but will not be part of the U.N. force.

The United States initially expressed reservations about the size of the proposed U.N. force. But Negroponte said the U.S. government has agreed to the deployment.

In a report last month recommending a U.N. force, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said the West African peacekeepers were overstretched and that requests for more money from donor nations hadn't been answered. Paris initially pressed for a U.N. decision by Feb. 4, the date authorization for the small U.N. military liaison mission and the West African troops expired. The Security Council extended the authorizations until Feb. 27. China's U.N. Ambassador Wang Guangya, the current council president, said he expects the U.N. force to be approved by Feb. 27.

The French want the U.N. force to monitor a cease-fire and assist Ivory Coast's transitional power-sharing government in disarming and repatriating the former combatants. They also want U.N. peacekeepers to help the government extend its authority throughout the country and prepare for elections in 2005.

Ivory Coast for decades was West Africa's most stable and prosperous country. It remains the world's largest cocoa producer, but a 1999 coup has ushered in political, regional, ethnic and religious tensions and violence. The country has been split between rebel north and government south since rebellion broke out in September 2002 after a failed coup. The Security Council has called on the parties to implement the peace agreement brokered in France a year ago that ended major fighting.

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.