Citation
BRUSSELS, April 18 (Reuter) - Belgian U.N. peacekeepers said on Monday
they were disgusted by their mission in Rwanda in which 10 of their
colleagues were killed.
Many of them witnessed massacres of civilians without being able to
intervene because the U.N. rules of engagement allowed them to fire
only in self-defence.
I'm... disgusted to have been with the U.N.,
one soldier told VTM
television. We've already ripped all our U.N. badges off and burned
our berets.
We couldn't do anything but watch,
a second peacekeeper said.
Another cut his beret to pieces with an army knife in front of
television cameras.
The U.N. soldiers' peacekeeping mandate also prevented them from trying
to free the 10 Belgians who were killed after they were surrounded and
disarmed by Rwandan government troops.
They must change the (U.N.) mandate,
said a fourth soldier, adding
that the Belgians' weapons had been too light.
The first 43 peacekeepers of a contingent of 420 returned to Belgium on
Monday. They were accompanied by 150 paratroopers, the first of a
contingent of 750 sent to Rwanda to evacuate Belgians and other
foreigners.
Belgium announced its withdrawal from the U.N.'s Rwanda operation after
the 10 were killed while trying to guard the prime minister in an orgy
of violence which erupted after President Juvenal Habyarimana was
killed in a rocket attack on a plane on April 6.
(c) Reuters Limited 1994
