France will send 400 more soldiers to the Central African Republic (CAR) where sectarian clashes still haunted the country despite the deployment of French and African forces to restore order, French President Francois Hollande’s office said Friday.
At the end of a defense meeting at the Elysee on the situation in its former colony, France decided to increase “temporarily” the number of its servicemen to 2,000 where already 1,600 have been deployed in the violence-torn African country, said the Elysee in a statement.
At the request of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to boost troops in the CAR, Paris was due to pour additional hundreds of soldiers of combat forces and gendarmes in the country and then they will took part in European forces’ operation since their deployment, according to the president’s office communique.
Reiterating the military operation’s objective “to stop the massacres, to prevent war crimes, to restore the population’s security,” Hollande stressed that “all enemies of peace will be fought” and “there will be no impunity for those who commit crimes.”
He also urged the delpoyment of peacekeepers in the CAR and humanitarian intervention after the country has plunged into chaos since mainly Muslim Seleka rebels seized power in March, leading to tit-for-tat clashes with “anti-Balaka” militia formed by the Christian majority.
Source: Xinhua
