UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has denounced abuses by the Central African Republic army and its foreign supporters, an allusion to paramilitary fighters from the Russia-linked Wagner group.
“I remain appalled by the continued increase in human rights abuses and violations of international humanitarian law perpetrated by all parties to the conflict, including excessive use of force,” Guterres said in a report submitted to the UN Security Council on Tuesday.
The nation has been mired in civil war since 2013.
While violence had decreased in the past few years, it resumed abruptly when rebels launched a failed offensive to overthrow Central African Republic President Faustin-Archange Touadera in late 2020.
“I urge national authorities to take demonstratable and immediate action to prevent grave human rights violations by national security forces and other security personnel, including abuses targeting ethnic and religious minorities,” Guterres said.
The UN uses the term “other security personnel” to refer to the hundreds of Russian paramilitary forces who fight alongside the army and who have helped them over the past year push back rebels from their strongholds.
The UN last year accused the mercenaries and the Central African Republic forces of abuse, alongside its ongoing condemnation of crimes against civilians by the country’s rebel groups.
In the new report, which covers the period since October last year, Guterres touches in particular on an operation near Bria, about 600km northeast of the capital, Bangui, by the national army and paramilitaries.
The operation, which occurred in the middle of last month, resulted “in 17 civilian deaths” and displacement of the general population, the report said, without providing further details.
Guterres said that the UN peacekeeping mission in the Central African Republic was denied access to the army and “other security personnel” on three occasions last month under the pretext that the sites where the events of concern had occurred “were private.”
“The humanitarian situation continued to deteriorate” since October last year, he said, adding that 63 percent of the population — or 3.1 million Central Africans — require protection and humanitarian assistance.
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