Valery Zakharov, President Touadera’s highly influential adviser on internal security, responded on Friday to comments from RFI by Mankeur Ndiaye, head of Minusca in the Central African Republic. Back from Russia, the latter declared on our airwaves that Moscow agreed to cooperate in the UN inquiry opened to allegations of abuses committed by Russian paramilitaries in the Central African Republic. These statements are “false”, Valery Zakharov responded on his Twitter account.
Mr NDiaye’s statements are false and have no relation to reality
– Valery Zakharov (@VlrZakharov) April 9, 2021
Irritant is noticeable in this reaction. Valery Zakharov, President Touadera’s special adviser on internal security, assures us on Twitter that he called Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Verchinin on Friday after hearing the comments. at RFI by the head of Minusca.
The deputy minister would then have assured him, he wrote, that the “crimes” assigned by a UN working group for mercenaries to Russian paramilitaries in the Central African Republic would not have been mentioned on Monday during the interview between the two men.
Why did President Touadera’s adviser initiate this telephone conversation? He, who does not officially represent any Russian authority in Bangui, although he is known for being close to Moscow and quickly taking a stand on Central African news on social networks, defends his country’s actions.
► Read also: Central African Republic: UN experts warn of possible abuses “attributable” to Russian paramilitaries
Russian official side, no reaction to the words of the head of Minusca at the moment. Halfway through March, the Russian Ambassador to Bangui, Vladimir Titorenko, had also stated that “Mr. Zakharov” had “nothing himself to do with Russia”. He is an adviser to the Central African president, but not “the head of Russian instructors” or “our military mission”, the ambassador explained.
Another reaction was that of the Central African Crisis Working Group (GTSC). His spokesman Paul-Crescent Beninga accuses Mankeur Ndiaye of “complicity with the rebels”, when the latter believes that in order to restore peace in the Central African Republic, we must not exclude dialogue with members of armed groups who have not committed crimes and have shown their willingness to end the ongoing uprising.
► Listening and also reading: UN: Moscow will cooperate in investigation of Russian paramilitary forces in CAR, according to Ndiaye
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