DRC: UN Security Council green-lights French peacekeeping operation

As I have 2 children and 1 on the way, it concerns me that the families of these children allow it. So I support the Peace-Keepers going in, but how they go about it is another thing, I'd like to think they try to avoid shooting children even if they're armed. Tough job that one

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The developing plot ....

I still don't get it . . . .

UN warns Rwanda over DR Congo (BBC)

Apparently this all has something to do with the mining economy?

So they're sending children to the front? Who's left to work the mines?

:m:,
Tiassa

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And while I'm at it . . . .

From last month: I missed this part -

Cannibal soldiers "selling human flesh" (Ananova)

That is ... the quote of the year: Pygmies are being pursued in the forests ... people have been eaten.

Put this one on telvision! Now.

I mean, I read the line with unusual calm: Pygmies are being pursued in the forests ... people have been eaten.

It actually makes me laugh in this bizarre post-Adams kind of way. I ... I don't know what to think. First the myth that having sex with a virgin cures AIDS ... now this?! Magic powers?

If anybody is left alive in the area after this conflict, we need to send an army of sociologists and anthropologists. This is ... amazing.

Magic powers?

The world has to ask itself some serious questions: The situation is intolerable; I would prefer to see the whole place nuked rather than let this go on unabated. Set a date, tell the people to get the hell out, and then just burn it all to dust.

Now, let me just get this straight:

- Child soldiers on drugs
- At least 3 nations (DRC, Uganda, Rwanda) involved
- 60,000 dead in Bunia in 4 years directly resulting from conflict; millions dead from the larger conflict
- Widespread rape and pillage
- They're eating Pygmies!

I think I've gone and lost my mind. My increasing awareness has resulted in an increasing sense of horror. I think I've just crossed into a Numb Zone.

"They're eating Pygmies." The phrase is so absurd that I don't know what to think. I look at the words on the screen and I titter. There's not enough drugs in the world to get me high enough to ever imagine that I would one day read that soldiers were eating Pygmies in order to obtain magic powers.

This is like Elvira meets H.R. Puffinstuff meets the godforsaken Devil itself.

I will wake up later today, and the whole world is going to look different.

:m:,
Tiassa

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And it begins

Peaekeepers kill two in DR Congo (BBC)

A little over a fortnight from approval to casualties. Would anybody like to guess whether the dead are children? Is that something we want them to acknowledge? Or is it appropriate to hedge for taste and withhold that information?

10 days from deployment to killing, though. But this is where it's going to start getting ugly.

But I do wonder why two lightly-armed militiamen would engage a patrol supported by a light tank. I'm tempted to make the joke that they should have eaten another Pygmy.

And that's just downright tasteless and unwarranted. Such is war.

:m:,
Tiassa

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Not the "embedding" I would hope for

DR Congo town faces "disaster" (BBC)

This is the update: Rape and pillage, UN deplores rape, especially that of young girls. French don't have enough troops. More on the way.

I reiterate that this war needs to be on television. Live and direct.

It will be such a change from the pretty lights over Baghdad. I admit, a journalist would have to be suicidal to get in the middle of that, but how about an airport webcam and cameras on patrol vehicles? Won't be the sharpest footage, but that'll just make it "cooler"; sort of a post-postmodern nightmare.

:m:,
Tiassa

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One for the scrapbook

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"Give me that mango!"

Actually, I just found this a striking image, and wanted to share it. The expression of the child on the left is ... I don't know, maybe I'm imagining it.

Maybe I should have put up the Filipino roasted pigs dressed like The Matrix.

:m:,
Tiassa

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......sometimes i forget the there are places where things like this still happen..........

 

Yep ... that's it

Thank you, Psycho. Turns out I'm not imagining it.

:m:,
Tiassa

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I wish you were.
A good therapist is cheaper and easier a sollution than whatever they will dig up...or not dig up to reslove this.

 

Re : Give me that mango

The real sentence is :

Hep, "miss Africa", you should put the right sentences... Some guys could think that it was true (no names to give

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Fair 'nuff

Fair 'nuff. But I did link to the original specifically for that purpose. For instance, you, SG-N ... you took the time to click it and read it.

It's my morbid sense of humor ....

:m:,
Tiassa

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Ituri: Covered in blood

Warning: The contents of the links in this post contain descriptions of human atrocity.

Human Rights Watch has announced the release of its report on the state of the conflict in DRC. It is called Ituri: Covered in Blood. (Available HTML & PDF)

From a page which apparently (at first glance) does not appear in the HTML version:

I'll skip the detailing of the sexual atrocities and the cannibalism and mutilations. Those are for you to read if you want. (Note: These links are targets ... take it up with your browser if they don't work.)

The report also deals with the international problem of DRC in terms of neighboring states. The report summary tells a dry but interesting story.

But do be warned ... the report is atrocious. It will turn your stomach.

:m:,
Tiassa

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French-led UN mission a "failure"

(1) International forces "fail DR Congo" (BBC)

Or, in MSF's words:

(2) Press Release: MSF denounces lack of protection and assistance for civilians in Ituri
(3) Ituri: Unkept Promises (.DOC file)

What can be said of politics and a few statistics? But the reality coming in from the bloody trail:

The French-led EU team is scheduled to serve until September 1, when command will go to a MONUC team, perhaps a better-organized rapid-response team.

:m:,
Tiassa

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They should be sending five times as many troops MINIMUM if they want to get anything done.

 

Grief, it's srebrenica all over again

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