19 military liaison officers deployed in region

Nineteen UN Military Liaison Officers (MLOs) have so far been deployed and begun operations in Kinshasa, Kampala, Kigali, Bujumbura, Lusaka, Harare and Windhoek to monitor the implementation of the Lusaka peace deal. Ninety MLOs were allowed for by the UN Security Council to prepare the ground for further UN support under the terms of the peace deal. In addition to the MLOs already in place, MONUC has requested a liaison team for the Angolan capital Luanda to make sure that every party to the conflict was covered. The deployment of an MLO team to Bangui in the Central African Republic - a non-combatant, but for which the DRC conflict has wide security and humanitarian implications - will follow the completion of the current presidential elections there, Massart said. MONUC's immediate priorities were to set up connections with all the relevant parties, begin the process of putting MLOs in the field and assure that the truce-overseeing Joint Military Commission (JMC) would be activated, he told IRIN. The next meeting of the JMC is scheduled for 10 October.