EU’s Chad Force Battles Sand, Heat and Rains at Darfur Border
GOZ BEIDA, Chad (EUX.TV) — At the end of his two-day visit to the European Union’s military forces here in the east of Chad, close to Darfur, the union’s foreign policy chief Javier Solana himself experiences directly what it’s like to work in the land-locked heart of Africa.
His French TransAll C-160 military transport plane is grounded only minutes before the scheduled take-off to Chad’s capital N’Djamena. As Solana walks towards the plane, red hydraulic liquid begins pouring forcefully from a under a flap on the starboard wing. It’s instantly evident that Solana’s return, and ours, is going to be delayed. The engines are shut down, and darkness sets in at the unlit airstrip.
That’s not deterring the European forces here. For a top-level V.I.P. like Solana, the French dispatch a second TransAll. When it shows up in the star-lit sky two hours later, Irish rangers light up fuel barrels along the dusty airstrip, allowing the plane to make what the military likes to call a ‘tactical landing’. It’s not without risk. Special forces are present with night-vision equipment.
Watch the C160 make the tactical landing in the dark at Goz Beida:
Nine days earlier, the airstrip and a few huts for local tribesmen were the only features in the immediate Goz Beida area, about 70 kilometers from the border with war-torn Darfur.
But as EU’s top diplomat visits, a team of 147 Irish Army engineers, together with a handful of Dutch and French, has begun constructing the Goz Beida operating base in a six-week assignment. From the 19th of May, Goz Beida will be home for a 230-strong Irish battalion and 60 Dutch Royal Marines, all under Irish command.
As the first journalists visiting the base, we see generators, a field kitchen, dormitories, toilets and three large tents behind the 10-feet levees, ditches and barbed wire. The quadrant base roughly covers the size of four football fields. Several dozen trucks, armored vehicles and four-wheel-drives are parked here.
The Goz Beida airstrip is the closest one to a series of camps for refugees from Darfur and internally displaced persons (IDP’s) from Chad in the south east of the country. These camps house more than half of the 180,000 IDPs in Chad and a quarter of the 285,000 refugees from Darfur.
The east of Chad is at the heart of an international humanitarian crisis with nearly half a million displaced people fleeing the fighting, not just in Darfur but also in Chad. As we visit, unconfirmed reports come in of continued fighting and pillaging. In a village of 2000 people, two percent of the population is said to have been murdered just a few days ago. The rest of the population supposedly fled the village. It’s a typical story. Unconfirmed. Horrible.
EUFOR CHAD Mandate ends March 2009
Pressured by international public upheaval over the ongoing atrocities in Darfur, the United Nations last September authorized the EU to deploy a military force in Chad. The mission, known as ‘EUFor Chad/CAR’, complements a hybrid African Union-United Nations force already deployed inside Darfur. Europe’s member states gave their final green light in January.
The mission began formally on the 15th of March, with what the military calls ‘Initial Operational Capability’. The current mandate ends officially a year later, in March 2009.
When it comes to Darfur, Europe’s role now is to protect refugees, civilians and aid workers in the east of Chad. That is to happen with a total of 3,700 European troops from 22 EU member states. So far, 2,400 troops have been deployed. France (1406 troops), Ireland (221) and Austria (156), Italy (109) and Belgium (80) are the five biggest contributors. Full deployment is expected this summer, with more troops from Poland, the Netherlands, Ireland, and additional helicopters from Russia.
“As military, we have to provide security,” says Brigade-General Jean-Philippe Ganascia, commander of EUFor-Chad, “with military means, with a force, acting as military a force. To the population, refugees, IDP’s, to the humanitarian community which is supporting them, and of course to protect ourselves in order to be in the right place at the right moment.”
Besides Chad, this EUFor mission also includes a deployment of 200 French troops near Birao in the Central African Republic, also offering protection to refugees there.
“I hope very much that our presence here will solve some of the problems that are being so dramatically exposed in this region,” says Solana as he completes his visit.
Militarization of refugee camps worries aid workers
Eastern Chad is home to various local rebel groups. Ethnic militias and bandits are responsible for frequent attacks. In the last year, about a dozen off-road vehicles used by aid groups have been hijacked. And some (ex-)combatants from Darfur live among the refugees in Chad.
“The militarization of the refugee camps is a concern,” says Jose Fischel de Andrade, Goz Beida bureau chief for the UN High Commission for Refugees, while briefing Solana.
“There’s a difference in perception on security. The situation still is not stable, especially close to the border. Security is our major pre-occupation, and we hope that EUFor will give us a hand.”
The killing less than a week earlier of French aid worker Pascal Marlinge, the country head for British aid group Save the Children, demonstrates that even with EU troops present, the risks remain real. Marlinge was killed by bandits only nine kilometers from the EUFor base in Forchana, under French command in the central part of eastern Chad. He is the third aid worker killed since January.
Humanitarian workers, wearing black armbands, are still mourning their colleague’s death as they receive Solana at the UN’s office in Abéché, the biggest town in eastern Chad. From this office, the work of 78 humanitarian agencies is coordinated. Some aid workers demand that Solana promises better security by providing military guards to protect them in the field.
No miracles to be expected, Solana tells aid workers
Solana tells them not to expect miracles. “The idea is not to put a soldier in each convoy, but to create secure conditions. We’re here to create a secure environment,” he says. “We cannot be in all places at once. There are no miracles. The situation is difficult.”
Abéché also is the location for EUFor’s main operational camp, to be known as Stars Camp. It’s still under construction, and the EU forces here work from an existing French camp for the time being. A modern Italian field hospital has been set up here. A local boy who broke his leg is the only patient as we visit. His father stays to keep him company.
From Abéché, the three ‘forward’ bases in Goz Beida, Forchana and Iriba – under Polish command in the north – are supported.
There is an EUFor special forces camp in the centre of town. This unit here includes elite specialists such Austria’s Jagdkommando and their colleagues from Sweden, Ireland. EUFor declines to provide details on the activities of special forces. These are likely to include observation activities in the Darfur border region.
So far, the EU is leaning heavily on the facilities of an existing French camp. EUFor’s permanent Stars Camp is under construction at the other side of the airport. It will have a capacity of nearly 2000 troops.
French accused of political support to Deby
For three decades now, the French army maintains a permanent military presence in its former colony with approximately one thousand troops. Chad became independent from France in 1960. France’s long-term mission is called ‘Epervier’, French fo ‘Sparrowhawk’. It’s an operation that provides logistics, intelligence and medical support to Chad. It includes camps in N’Djamena and Abéché. Epervier started in 1986, helping contain a Libyan plan to invade the country.
“If we pull out, Chad will be cut up into pieces from all sides, even now,” said a senior French military official.
France’s direct involvement in Chad regularly touches political sensitivities. It often finds itself accused of direct political support to Presidency Idriss Deby, drawing fire from opposition parties in Chad.
Chad and Darfur accuse each other of helping rebels in the diffuse border area in the east. In February, pro-Sudan rebels reached the capital and attempted to oust Deby in an offensive. French forces aided the loyalists, keeping the gates of the presidential palace defended until enough of them arrived back in the capital to stop the offensive.
Traveling to the scenes of that fighting in N’Djaména’s government district feels like visiting the set of a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie.
Artillery among the rubble
Remnants of the February battle are clearly visible in the trash-ridden streets. Abandoned pieces of artillery are among the rubble. We are told that Deby has ordered the destruction of almost all buildings across the street from his offices. This to give his security forces a better view of the area, and to make harder for opponents to attack the palace.
February’s fighting in N’Djaména is directly related to the situation in the east and in Darfur. The talk here is that the rebel attack was designed particularly to draw away Deby-loyal fighters from the east of the country, leaving their villages vulnerable to pillaging by combatants from Sudan and displacing even more people. Getting the Deby-loyalists out of the east appears to have been the real objective of February’s offensive.
The fruitless peace deal that Deby signed in Dakar, Senegal, in March with Sudan’s President Omar Hassan al-Bashir is the topic of Solana’s meeting with Deby the night before he travels to the east. As Solana visited, fresh peace talks between Chad and Sudan were due to take place in Libya soon.
“There will be a meeting in the coming days in Tripoli to check how that can be implemented,” Solana said after meeting Deby, referring to the Dakar agreement.
But by the end of the week, diplomatic ties between Chad and Sudan are cut. Sudan’s capital Khartoum is attacked by rebels in an offensive strikingly similar to the one on N’Djamena in February. Sudan claims the attack was inspired by Chad government. Berry says he’s not involved.
People on the ground emphasize that the EUFor mission is one of a completely different nature than the French mission. It’s not a political mission, but one with a clear humanitarian objective.
Water supplies pose major challenge
And there are major differences when it comes to water, fuel and logistics.
The EU troops will not live like the French ‘Epervier’ soldiers, acting like locals by consuming only three of four liters of water per day. NATO standards call for 110 liters of water per day, 10 of which is drinking water. Even when standards are reduced to 60 liters – as is the case at EUFor – supplying sufficient fresh water for 3,700 troops in the middle of the desert remains a serious challenge. Responsible consumption is actively encouraged.
“Imagine what would happen here if we were to drill wells and deplete all the water in this town in a few years,” says an Irish support engineer. “There would be nothing left. We can’t afford to create such future problem, so we have to find other ways, like recycling waste water.”
The EUFor operating area is roughly the size of Germany and France combined, approximately 280,000 square kilometers. The long distances here create particular challenges for fuel and logistics.
Most of the heavy equipment and supplies are shipped by sea to Douala, Cameroon – a two-week journey from Europe. From there, the containers, trucks and other vehicles face a 1,700 kilometer overland journey. That distance is similar to the Rome-Stockholm stretch, on roads far, far worse. Materials for the Irish battalion in Goz Beida are currently underway on this road.
“The distance and road conditions between here and Abeche and indeed, more specifically Goz Beida, are probably the largest single difficulty we have,” says Enda de Bruin, who oversees Irish army logistics at EUFor from Camp Europa near N’Djamena.
By air, it takes between four and nine hours to reach Chad from Europe, depending on the type of aircraft. Having sufficient airlift capacity inside the country is seen as essential for this mission in the heart of Africa. France has offered 12 tons per day; the equivalent of about three C-160 flights. By air, the route between N’Djaména and Abéché is 760 kilometer long. By road, it would take 5 days in the dry season to travel the 1,380 kilometers.
Rain season triggers battle against time
And then of course there’s the rain season. Once the rains start, travel over land will become significantly more difficult. The N’Djamena-Abéché trip could take as long as two weeks. The rains are expected to start at the end of May or the beginning of June.
Ditches have been dug at all the EUFor camps to be able to handle substantial amount of water coming from above. Camp Europa has already been nicknamed “little Venice.”
In Goz Beida, the first rains have come already. As Solana’s motorcade travels towards the Gourourkoun IDP camp, it quickly becomes evident that the rains will be a significant factor.
The Irish eagerly await the arrival of 60 Dutch Royal Marines with their Viking traction vehicles. These vehicles are originally designed for use in polar NATO missions, but they proved very effective for the Dutch in Afghanistan. The Dutch Vikings allow the EUFor troops to patrol even when the rains make local travel for normal vehicles impossible.
Although the prospect of the rains places a lot of pressure on the deployment, the rains themselves are not necessarily a disadvantage for EUFor, says Brigade General Jean-Philippe Ganascia, Commander of EUFOR, whose international experience includes a multinational rapid reaction force in Bosnia.
“This rain is a handicap for those we are running after, those we are trying to fight,” he says. “The raining season could be a handicap, but we are going to use it best we can.”
At the Gouroukoum IDP camp, the elders use Solana’s visit to raise interest for their plight.
Displaced ask for bridge across wadi
They’d like to move back to their town on the border with Darfur, but want to do so only once a bridge has been built across a wadi. That is a dry riverbed that floods once the rains start. With such a bridge, they say they can escape faster when their village is attacked by the Janjaweed, armed gunmen on horseback who cross the border from Sudan.
When the wadi is flooded, they simply can not escape the violence. That is why they have stayed in this camp for two years already.
As we visit, aid agencies have already delivered sufficient food to last the people in Gouroukoum for some time. Once these supplies run out, and if the rains have not yet disappeared, these displaced people face new problems. Security is only one of them.
Europe’s Darfur mission has a mandate for one year, until March 2009. In September, the EU will begin its mid-mandate review of the mission. The situation on the ground, the experience gained so far, and the readiness of the EU countries will determine if Europe will continue to make a difference in this desperate part of the world.
– Raymond Frenken, founder and editor of EUX.TV – the Europe channel, accompanied Mr Solana on his visit to Chad as freelance journalist. This report is written exclusively for the EUX.TV website. Republication of this article, in print or on another website, without explicit permission from EUX.TV, is strictly forbidden.
(c) EUX.TV 2008 news@eux.tv
