UN agency distributes reinsertion packages to ex-combatants

The UN Development Programme (UNDP) has begun the distribution of reinsertion packages - comprising clothes, blankets, cooking utensils and food - to disarmed former combatants in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the agency reported on Wednesday.

In an effort marking the beginning of the reinsertion programme, the UNDP deputy administrator and director of the Bureau of Crisis Prevention and Recovery, Julia Taft, presided over the distribution on Saturday to 30 former combatants in Kindu, in the province of Maniema, eastern Congo.

UNPD reported that Taft, who visited the Congo from 22 to 26 April, personally handed over the first reinsertion kit during the ceremony attended by the region's local authorities and the UNDP representative in the country, Herbert M'cleod. The former combatants who received the kits had already surrendered their weapons to the UN Mission in the DRC, known as MONUC, and had undergone formal registration.

"This is not the last assistance they will get, but it is the first, so this is very symbolic and very important," Taft was quoted as saying during the ceremony.

"These ex-combatants need some basic equipment for starting a new life, and the kit is enough for the period until they will start receiving training or find jobs," she added.

UNDP reported that during her visit, Taft undertook a three-day mission to the troubled eastern part of the country, where the transitional government, with technical aid from UNDP, is making plans for the disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration (DDR) of an estimated 330,000 combatants "still carrying arms and threatening to destabilise the fragile peace in the region".

In the eastern towns of Beni and Bunia, Taft met with local authorities, MONUC, UNDP and UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs officials, as well as several NGO representatives who included those of many women's groups.

"We need to have special kits for women, and we have asked women's organisations here (in DRC) to think with us what should be in them," Taft was quoted as saying. "We need to think through what are the particular needs of women."