United Nations African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID)?

Question

Is a joint African Union and UN peacekeeping mission formally approved by United Nations Security Council Resolution 1769 on 31 July 2007 to bring stability to the war-torn Darfur region of Sudan while peace talks on a final settlement continue. It was initially given a mandate of 12 months (i.e. until 31 July 2008) with a force of about 26,000 personnel, and is to begin to deploy to the region in October 2007. The 7,000-strong African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), which is presently responsible for peacekeeping, is expected to be merged into this new force by 31 December 2007.[1]The force will include up to 19,555 military personnel and up to 3,772 police, along with a further "19 formed police units comprising up to 140 personnel each." [2] The peacekeepers will be allowed to use force to protect civilians and humanitarian operations. UNAMID will be the first joint UN/AU force and the largest peacekeeping mission. On 12 August 2007 Alpha Oumar Konare, the chairman of the African Union, announced UNAMID was likely to be an all-African peacekeeping force.[3] However, the following countries have stated they are likely to take part in the peacekeeping mission at one point or another:. Countries taking part include Bangladesh, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, China, Denmark, Djibouti, Egypt, Ethiopia, France, Ghana, Indonesia, Ireland, Jordan, Malaysia, Nepal, Netherlands, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Rwanda, Senegal, Sweden, Tanzania, Thailand, Uganda, and United Kingdom. Question Conranger, What type of Unit is Ireland supplying? Any of your mates going? I will know in about 2 weeks if I am going and what post I get. Looks like a reasonably sized force is being put into place, however having seen Bangladesh, Nepalese (they are not Gurkha standard), Pakistan and several of the African countries troops before during previous missions they are not much to rely on, But good to see the French are there (oxymoron I know, but it’s the Legion not really Frenchmen), UK and solid Scandinavians, what was a surprise was seeing China involved, until I did some research and see they are building Sudan’s oil pipeline and are the major purchasers of said oil.

Answer 1

Paddy from what I hear the Irish will be sending Engineers & Medical, please read under:

"Defence Forces News"

Minister for Defence, Willie O’Dea secures Cabinet approval for Chad mission

20 November 2007.

The Minister for Defence Willie O’Dea, T.D., has secured Cabinet approval for the deployment of 400 Irish troops for the UN mandated EU military operation in the Republic of Chad. Minister O’Dea will now proceed to seek Dáil approval for the mission. This will complete the Triple Lock mechanism of UN, Government and Dáil approval before deploying members of the Defence Forces overseas.

Ireland will play a significant and substantive role in this mission as the second largest contributor and provider of the overall Operation Commander: Lt. Gen Pat Nash.

“Our contribution represents the Defence Forces’ most ambitious and challenging overseas deployment to date. Our role is threefold: to help establish a safe and secure environment for refugees, to facilitate the delivery of humanitarian aid to the refugees and to protect UN and humanitarian personnel. The carnage in Darfur coupled with the multiple conflicts in the border areas between Darfur, Chad and the Central African Republic has scarred the lives of countless thousands of innocent men, women and children. It will be our job to help and protect them and today the Government accepted my recommendation to deploy to the region,” stated Minister O’Dea.

“Yesterday in Brussels, I met with Lt General Pat Nash who briefed Ministers on the mission’s current state of preparedness, particularly on the emerging gaps in transport resources, especially the heavy airlift and helicopter assets. On foot of that briefing I urged my EU colleagues at the joint meeting of EU Defence and Foreign Ministers to move quickly to address these shortfalls in the force structure. I am confident they will be addressed satisfactorily as gaps of this nature are not unusual during the planning phase of any overseas operation. A Force Generation conference is taking place tomorrow (Wednesday November 21st) in Brussels to specifically address these key issues and I will then discuss the outcome of this meeting with military officials,” added Minister O’Dea.

Not known to the world in general is that the Chinese military are deployed as security guards on Chinese oil structures in the region for yonks!!!

The French were deployed in Lebanon and performed ok as well both the Legion and the Regulars, they come in handy seeing French is the second language in that area and they have been in tCHAD for years.

We had the Nepalese with us for years in U.N.I.F.I.L, they performed o.k. but are piss-poor, keep your "attractive items" under lock and key!!!

I will not post info on any buds going over on a public net (security).

Answer 2

I can sort of answer the Question about Irelands Involvement.If you had asked this Question last week I would have had a Better Answer as the Minister of Defence was talking about it on Television. I think 200 Men was mentioned, also a Group of The Ranger Unit ,its an Elite Unit of Highly Trained Men.It is used as a Commando Style Assault Unit, say in Terrorist Situations, I heard 22 Men, Possibly some Police as well.The Minister said there was a Problem with Aercraft, Helicopters. We are not Supplying the Aercraft somebody else is.IT is kind of up in the Air at moment whether they will go or not. The Sudanese Government is Prevaricating as usual, they do not want anyone there. It looks good though for them going in. There is a Problem with the French,as they support the Chadian Government and have a Base there anyway.The Sudanese is a bit iffy about the French.

Answer 3

If they are ever allowed in; right now the Sudanese government is still throwing lots of roadblocks in the way. The make up, in particular the African contingent, was required by the Sudanese government and a restriction they placed on the number of "prior colonial powers" participation is the reason for a lot of the other smaller countries being involved with minimal numbers that could have been filled by other cut "colonial" troops. The Chinese will be interesting to watch and see how they perform, some have suggested they will be more interested in protecting the Sudanese government and oil assets then in helping te civilians. The definition of civilian is also being played with by the Sudanese government who wants to exclude any one who fought against them from the definition-not those militia members that supported them however.

Answer 4

they have fields of oil, gas, minerals etc, so you tell me who stands to benefit from this genocide? RRRR