Ugandan Foreign Minister on Peace-keeping and the Al Shabaab

Foreign Minister Hon Sam Kutesa [NRM, Sembabule] on 22nd July chaired
a United Nations Security Council debate on the theme “ Post-conflict
peace building”. Uganda, a non-permanent member representing African
countries, ends a one-month period as chair of world’s most powerful
body. Here is a text of that interview in which he discusses the Security Council,
peace-keeping and Somalia’s Al Shabaab.
peace-keeping troops. The interview was done at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington DC.
It was submitted to the Sunday Monitor

Sunday Monitor [SM]: Following up on that theme since we come from the Great Lakes
region which successful model on post-conflict peace building would
you point to and say this could work?

Sam Kutesa SK]: Without doubt Burundi. Burundi succeeded because the initiative
was led by the region and the international community supplemented the
regional effort. Earlier on there were attempts to broker a peace
process in Burundi and the Carter Center had been approached and they
tried but by the time President Carter got to know the names of
Burundi [like] Ntugagaganyure, Nkurunzinza, it became a mess so the
region took the initiative. Initially chaired by President [Julius]
Nyerere and then President Nelson Mandela and after that President
[Yoweri Museveni] with South Africa as the facilitator and the UN
backing them. Now you can see the conflict in Burundi has ended, all
the parties are part of government. They have also had elections and
are preparing for another set of elections. So we think that model has
worked.

So in this discussion [on post conflict peace building] we are saying
regional initiatives should be leading supplemented by the United
Nations and the international community. The other outcome is that
when you are involved in peace making do not consider it as one phase.
You should look at peace-making, peace-building simultanasly because
if you concentrate on peace-making and you do not look at peace
building which involves resettlement and development, normally the
experience has shown that after conflict there is a window of about 24
months with people having expectations, settling down and giving peace
a chance, but with no plans for peace-building as you had in
peace-making then you have no program to immediately kick off
resettlement and development and then there is a tendency for
countries to relapse into conflict. Like now, we are working in
Somalia we must take into the need for peace building. In other words,
suppose the conflict ended today, what program do you have to kick off
immediately so that people are not disillusioned and can see the
dividends of peace and lessen the chances of the country relapsing
into conflict.

SM: Uganda has featured prominently in debate of peace versus justice
and which comes first or can they be had simultaneously. What is your
personal take on this?

SK: My view is that you must never condone impunity but at the same
time you must balance the desire to punish the guilty with the need to
establish durable peace and they do not come easy. It a delicate
balance.

SM: Is this the situation Uganda finds itself in with regard to
President Omar el Bashir?

SK: Forget about Bashir lets first talk about Joseph Kony because we
want him prosecuted but at the same as you may have seen in our
negotiations in Juba, we were willing to establish internal mechanisms
of dealing with impunity without compromising durable stability and
security. And indeed the Rome Statute of the International Criminal
Court provides for exhausting local remedies first. In the case of
Bashir, we as Uganda completely support the ICC position that anybody
who commits violations of human rights or engages in genocide aught to
be tried but we are also members of the African Union which passed a
resolution as soon as the indictments were made that we as African
Union should investigate on our own the veracity of these charges and
then take a position. Former South African President Thabo Mbeki who
is heading that investigation is doing so and has been to Sudan and
other countries and will be reporting to the AU.

So we are committed to the ICC and committed to the AU resolution. As
soon as the AU makes its decision then we will comply, as we must with
our ICC obligations.

There is no confusion. I am sure about one thing that President Bashir
is not going to come to Uganda so that should not worry you.

SM: In the case of Somalia you spoke of the continuum between peace
keeping and peace-building. What happens in a situation where there is
no-peace to keep?

SK: We considered this aspect. The primary responsibility of the
Security Council is to maintain world peace and security. That’s the
objective of the Security Council and its only role. So if there is no
peace it is still the obligation of the Security Council to establish
that peace. You have seen it happen in Kosovo and Serbia. Working with
the region you have seen it happen in Burundi, Liberia and Sierra
Leone. So you participate with regional initiatives to establish the
peace, then to keep it and then to build it.

SM: Can that be applied to the current situation because there is a
fully-fledged civil war going on?

SK: What we are doing in Somalia where Uganda is as part of the
African Union Peace Keeping force [AMISOM] is a twin mandate. One is
to protect the Transitional Federal Government and its institutions,
secondly is for us to train Somalis to takeover the security of their
country. In other words as AMISOM train an army and a police force.

Its true that there is a fully-fledged civil war but it is the Somalis
to end that. What we are trying to do on behalf of the Security
Council and the AU is to create capacity in Somalia for the Somalis to
takeover their own security. In 1979 the Tanzanians came and got rid
of Idi Amin. But the Tanzanians could not have hoped to stay there
forever neither would Ugandans accept them. I think the same thing
would happen in Somalia. Ugandans are not supposed to be there
forever. It would be the Somalis who would want to kick us out faster
than anyone else. But what did the Tanzania do? It created the
capacity of the UNLA and withdrew. Then you can have your own internal
conflicts of NRA and so forth. But those internal conflicts are
resolved by Ugandans themselves. So that’s what we are attempting to
do in Somalia; to create the peace by using Somalis and therefore
supporting the TFG

SM: How far is Uganda willing to go to supporting the TFG? Ugandan
peacekeepers are being killed in Mogadishu. If you are saying Somalis
should resolve this themselves at what point to you [leave it to them]

SK: Am not saying they should resolve it themselves but we should help
them to create the capacity to do so and we shall stay for as long as
it takes to create that capacity.

SM: Do you think as AMISOM you have the capacity to prevent the TFG
from collapsing? In the greater scheme of things you are really
protecting a government that has already fallen [being that you have
control over small areas like the Presidential palace]

SK: We are not protecting a government that has already fallen. We are
protecting a government that came in from Nairobi. It only came to
that part. It has never occupied the rest of Somalia and it hasn’t
been kicked out. We are protecting it where it was stationed and we
hope it will expand because the Al Shabaab have no capacity to overrun
us. No capacity at all but its our rules of engagement we are not
involved in pushing them away. That should be done by Somalis who are
trained by us and others under AMISOM. If it was a case of pushing
them away that would not have been a problem. But that’s not allowed
under our rules of engagement.

SM: But would you consider pushing them back considering the present situation?

SK: If the rules of engagement were changed we could but we are also
loathe to become to o deeply involved in local matters. We would
consider it carefully.

SM: Its been reported that Uganda is supplying weapons to the TFG?
Will AMISOM not been seen as the enemy by the other belligerents?

SK: We are not supplying as Uganda. There is a partial lifting of the
embargo [against arms supplies with regard to TFG] and the United
States and other countries who support the TFG are supplying them with
arms. Its true that when the arms come we receive them and hand them
out but we are not the source.

SM: Still won’t the anti-TFG fighters view AMISOM as the enemy?

SK: I would imagine so because we are not just supplying weapons we
have personnel there. Obviously you are already a legitimate target
they already think you are there to stop them from their overall
objective of taking power. We are neutral in this one sense that we as
Uganda have no national interests in Somalia. They have accused the
Ethiopians and Kenyans with whom they share a border of having such an
interest. But as Uganda there is no other earthly reason we are in
Somalia other than to ensure that another African country does not
become a failed state.