U.N. Envoy Urges Aid for Central Africa

UNITED NATIONS — The Algerian diplomat appointed as the U.N.’s special envoy to Zaire, Burundi and Rwanda said Tuesday that it may take a huge injection of Western aid--a “mini-Marshall Plan”--to halt the spiral of violence in the war-ravaged Central African nations.

Mohamed Sahnoun will go to Africa next week to try to halt the bloodshed, which includes a civil war in Zaire and a cycle of attacks and reprisals by ethnic Hutus and Tutsis in Rwanda and Burundi. He said his first step will be to contact “all groups” in the area, including Tutsi rebels seeking to overthrow the government of Zairian President Mobutu Sese Seko.

But he added that the solution to the strife lies in stronger ties of culture and commerce among the three countries and that economic development might need to be kick-started with Western aid.

He did not mention any figures or specify which countries might contribute. His reference to a “mini-Marshall Plan” hearkens to the American post-World War II assistance program that helped rebuild Europe and was named for George Marshall, President Harry S. Truman’s secretary of state.

Sahnoun spoke to reporters after meeting with the Security Council, which approved his appointment by new Secretary-General Kofi Annan. Sahnoun also will represent the Organization of African Unity. He said he got a positive reaction from council members to his remarks about Western aid. The American mission to the U.N. would not comment on Sahnoun’s remarks.

The U.S. provides no direct aid to Zaire but spent $4.8 million on development in Rwanda in fiscal 1995-96, according to the Agency for International Development.

For the current fiscal year, which began Oct. 1, 1996, the U.S. has funded $4.85 million in projects in Rwanda and $2.59 million in Burundi. In humanitarian assistance, the U.S. has spent $121.75 million in the region so far in this fiscal year, compared with $158.73 million last year and $320.68 million the year before.

Sahnoun also said there was no discussion among council members of reviving a proposal to send a multinational military force to impose stability on the region.

Late last year, the United States hesitantly agreed to participate in such a force, which was to be led by Canada, when it was reported that more than 1 million refugees displaced by the warfare were threatened with starvation.

Most of the refugees, however, unexpectedly returned to their homeland of Rwanda, and the military intervention was called off.

In recent weeks, reports from the area suggest that the situation has worsened. The U.N. refugee agency repeated warnings Tuesday that an estimated 200,000 Rwandan refugees trapped by fighting in eastern Zaire are edging toward what an official called “a humanitarian disaster.”

The refugees are ethnic Hutus who did not return to Rwanda with the others last year. They include Hutu extremists who participated in the genocide of more than 800,000 Rwandan Tutsis and moderate Hutus in 1994 before being forced out of the country when the Tutsi-dominated military assumed power.

Hutu extremists have also been blamed for a recent series of attacks on foreigners in Rwanda, including the killing of three Spanish aid workers Jan. 18.

Meanwhile, there have been reports of reprisals against Hutus who did return to Rwanda.

The Rwandan government, which blames the international community for failing to intervene and stop the 1994 genocide, viewed the Sahnoun appointment warily.

“My own perception is that this won’t bring any dramatic change to what’s wrong in the region,” Theogene Rudasingwa, Rwanda’s ambassador to the United States, said in a telephone interview from Washington. “For the last three years, from Rwanda’s perception, the international community has failed to understand the situation, or has understood it and failed to act, or has acted and been too late.”

In Zaire, Sahnoun’s arrival coincides with the launch of a government counteroffensive against the rebels, who control much of the eastern section of the country. There are persistent, but unconfirmed, reports that the Zairian military has enlisted the help of mercenaries in their push.