Eurasia Press & News
European Union ministers discussed plans Monday to send hundreds of troops to the Central African Republic, a rare joint military mission aimed at restoring order amid fears of sectarian violence.
Arriving for an EU foreign ministers’ meeting, several ministers spoke in favour of the rapid deployment of a force numbering anywhere between 400 and 1,000 to help back French and African forces already on the ground in the impoverished nation.
“We face a political and humanitarian emergency in the Central African Republic,” said Sweden’s Foreign Minister Carl Bildt. “We clearly need to do something.”
As ministers discussed what would be the EU’s first major ground operation in six years, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon warned the country was in “a crisis of epic proportions” and urged the world “to pull CAR back from the brink of further atrocities.”
