Over the last years, several armed groups have ceased their criminal activities and have surrendered arms to the authorities in the Central African Republic (CAR). Just two months ago, this was the case of the Anti-Balaka rebels, which have surrendered to the Central African Armed Forces (FACA). Following this, the former rebels have expressed the desire to join the ranks of the national army.
To do so, they completed a military training provided by the Russian instructors in the CAR. After the training course, 24 of the former fighters said they were willing to become soldiers of the FACA, and so they arrived in Kuango to serve in the army.
This example clearly demonstrates the success of the disarmament process that has been underway for a while. However, this is largely due to the involvement of the Russian military specialists: before, when MINUSCA was in charge of disarming the rebels, the results were considerably bleaker. Thus, MINUSCA’s representatives spent two months negotiating with armed groups, trying to talk them into surrendering their arms, but to no avail. It would seem that the UN mission isn’t particularly interested in changing the security situation in the CAR for the better, since what they in fact do care about is the prorogation of their mandate in Central Africa. Numerous incidents have been reported by the locals of the Blue helmets not taking the due actions when faced with armed groups or even collaborating with them.
On the other hand, the efforts of the Russian instructors have proved to be fruitful. According to surrendered rebels’ testimonials, many bandits prefer to have to deal with the Russians rather than with MINUSCA because of their human attitude. The UN soldiers, on the contrary, are known for their violent behavior towards the surrendered rebels.
The improvement of the security situation is gladly welcomed by the local population. Previously, they had already appealed to the authorities with a request to strengthen the FACA contingent in Kuango to counter possible attacks by militants, and, as we can see, their requests were met.
