United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (Kinshasa)
Joseph Tchimanga
2 October 2008
During the weekly MONUC press conference of 2 October 2008, MONUC Force Commander General Babacar Gaye said that despite the crisis in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, a lot of progress has been accomplished thanks to the help and support of MONUC.
After a three and half year mandate in the Democratic Republic of Congo as MONUC Force Commander, General Gaye bid farewell to the Congolese population through the press, saying that the country's situation was difficult but not desperate.
"When one makes a retrospective look over the last three years since 2005, there is evidently enormous progress," he underlined, making allusion to the general situation of the DRC and to the execution of MONUC's mandate.
He assessed the MONUC forces, estimating that even though it is part of the overall mission, there are numerous initiatives that the force took under his command.
MONUC forces were "close in their support to the national army. We received a mandate from Security Council resolution 1756, which placed battalions in the east, and the forces were mandated to use force where necessary," he said.
MONUC, explained General Gaye, "is a United Nations force that is atypical, not only by its size, but also by the nature of its activities and by the fact that it had to use force."
He recognized however that despite the progress achieved, much remains to be done. Yet he is convinced that his successor, General Vicente Diaz de Villegas, "is a determined officer" who will make the best of himself so that the whole sacrifice of the Blue Helmets, often supreme, is not in vain.
Finally General Gaye thanked the Congolese people, who he said were "believers and workers who had who have suffered a lot," and said he will keep them in his heart forever.
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