The UN Security Council extended the arms embargo on the Central African Republic for 12 months, with member states expressing concern about the situation, which “continues to pose a threat to international peace and regional security.”
The Council approved the extension of the ban by a majority of ten votes with five abstentions, including China, the only country that abstained during the previous extension, as well as Gabon, Ghana, Kenya and Russia.
Fighting continues in Central Africa, one of the world’s poorest countries. His army recently repelled a rebel attack in the east, and United Nations forces announced that they had recaptured a city in the north.
Government forces, backed by Rwandan soldiers and hundreds of Russian paramilitaries, have succeeded since late December 2020 in retaking most of the two-thirds of the country’s territory, which had been controlled by the rebels for years.
An arms embargo was imposed in 2013 after a coalition of armed groups overthrew the regime of President François Boziz and plunged the country into civil war.
It has been cut several times under pressure from the CAR authorities, who see the measure as weakening them in the face of insurgents acquiring weapons on the black market.
Source: AFP.