Editor,

Allow me to react to the article, "FDLR: Is the delayed offensive an inside job?” (The New Times, February 16).

Contrary to European Union (EU) Ambassador Michael Ryan’s view, there is nothing difficult about the military side of going after the FDLR. The difficulty lies entirely in the political realm, and here the major powers in the UN Security Council, including some from Ambassador Ryan’s own EU, are the culprits.

There was no lack of such political will where the decision to go after the M23 was concerned, including the willingness to inflict death and other casualties among the innocent civilian population in areas controlled by M23, many of whom perished as a result of the determined UN-led offensive that defeated the rebel group whose core was composed of mutineers from the FARDC.

That the UN would go full out with such fury against a home-grown Congolese rebel force which was the deadliest enemy of a genocidal foreign band of killers (the FDLR), which also not coincidentally happens to be the original and still the principal root cause of the insecurity and instability in eastern DRC, while determinedly refusing to do the same against the latter in fulfillment of its core mandate, forces any reasonable person to only make one conclusion: it is in the interest of those behind Monusco (who are prepared to spend US$1.5 billion a year indefinitely) to make eastern DRC safe for the FDLR.

The only question then that needs to be asked is: Why? Is it in support of the FDLR, to ensure it is not annihilated from that area on the border with Rwanda? Or perhaps, is it because the insecurity and instability the continued presence of the FDLR creates provides a plausible justification for the indefinite presence of Monusco?

If it’s the latter, why do/does its sponsor(s) consider it necessary to keep a force in the area under its/their control? We need to have some answers to these questions very quickly, because otherwise, on its face, the decision-making on this issue from New York and various Western capitals seem to make little if any sense.

Their rhetoric (elimination of all illegal armed groups to ensure security for the eastern DRC civilian population and peace for the wider region) and what they actually do or refuse to do (make eastern DRC very super safe for the FDLR) are clearly at odds.

As has always been the case, action speaks louder than words. And the series of actions that led to this point all point to the same inexorable conclusion: From Operation Turquoise through all the provision of specialized medical assistance for Mudacumura, to the air ferrying of FDLR terrorist leaders to Rome, to the ruthless suppression of any Congolese armed groups targeting the FDLR to laughable noisy ultimatums addressed to the FDLR that we all know will not be followed up with action or make-believe offence, to the la test pass-the-buck play between New York/Monusco and Kabila, the UN and those who really control its decision-making on our sub-region have been consistent in their actions. And our conclusion: there is a clear intent to make the situation safe for the FDLR to survive as a going-concern.

Is it so as to justify the perpetuation of forces they control in situ, and in turn the oil and other resources the sub-region is said to be rich in? I really can’t say. But obviously something smells to high heaven and it isn’t the dry tilapia fish from Lake Kivu.

Mwene Kalinda