The United Nations is withdrawing its missions from the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan in 2023 after failing on its mandate to help the two countries realise peace.

The UN Security Council this past Friday decided to terminate the mandate of the UN political mission in Sudan from December 3 after Khartoum called for its immediate withdrawal last month.

Sudan’s military Government, whose forces have been battling the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia for control of the country since April, has said that the UN mission was failing to meet expectations.

The end of the UN Integrated Transitional Assistance Mission in Sudan (UNITAMS) comes against the backdrop of the continuing war raging between rival militaries that has claimed over 6,000 lives, driven millions from their homes, led to abhorrent sexual and gender-based violence, and precipitated a severe humanitarian crisis.

Adopting resolution 2715 (2023) by 14 votes in favour and one abstention (Russia), the Security Council requested UNITAMS “immediately start on 4 December 2023, the cessation of its operations and the process of the transfer of its tasks, where appropriate and to the extent feasible, to UN agencies, funds and programmes, to complete this by 29 February 2024.”

The Council also decided that the Mission’s liquidation shall commence on 1 March 2024, and underlined the need for an orderly transition to ensure the safety of UN personnel and the effective functioning of all UN operations.

The development comes at a time when the UN is withdrawing peacekeepers from eastern DRC.

Congolese leader, Félix-Antoine Tshisekedi earlier this year told the UN General Assembly in New York that after the decades-long presence of a large UN peacekeeping mission, the Democratic Republic of the Congo will, by the end of the year, aim to take full control of its destiny and become the primary actor in its stability.

He said the gradual withdrawal of the mission, known as MONUSCO, is a necessary step to consolidate the progress made by DR Congo.

Tshisekedi deplored peacekeeping missions deployed in one form or another for almost 25 years in the DR Congo were neither able to control rebellions and resolve armed conflicts, nor protect civilian populations.

The President instructed his Government to begin discussions with UN officials to accelerate and bring forward the MONUSCO withdrawal deadline by one year: from December 2024 to December 2023.

Equipment 

ChimpReports understands the UN has already started withdrawing its equipment from North Kivu where locals have previously protested their failure to contain the militia groups operating in the area including M23 rebels.

President Museveni recently accused the United Nations of “conserving” terrorism in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and breeding chaos in multiple countries in the Sahel region.

“Part of the terrorism in Africa is either created or conserved by some of the actors that try to be global policemen,” he observed.

President Kagame has also accused the United Nations of betraying a pledge to combat Hutu extremists in eastern Congo and then blaming his country for the failure of a costly peacekeeping mission to end years of conflict.

“The international community spends $1.2bn (£800m) every year on that mission in the Congo. Why would the international community spend so much and say they want to come and deal with the problem and they don’t deal with it?” wondered Kagame a few years ago.

Speaking after the Security Council vote that ended the UN’s mission in Sudan, the representative of Russia said that such a position “is not arrived at random” and that the Security Council “has to admit candidly” that the Mission did not manage to carry out its mandated tasks, created at the request of Sudan to support the political transition process following the ouster of former ruler Omar al-Bashir in 2019.

“It stopped tallying with the changed reality of the country and it started working in the interest of just one political group, which did not enjoy mass support in the Sudanese society,” she said, underscoring that the ending of UNITAMS is the sovereign right of the Sudanese authorities.

UNITAMS was established by the Security Council in June 2020 as a special political mission, to provide support to Sudan for an initial 12-month period during its political transition to democratic rule. Its mandate was subsequently extended in 2021 and 2022.

Headquartered in Khartoum, UNITAMS supported the country through a range of political, peacebuilding and development initiatives, including assisting the nation in achieving the goals of the Constitutional Declaration of August 2019 and carrying out its National Plan for Civilian Protection.