The South African Navy & Marine and Coastal Management: Tag Sudan

SA to send more troops to Sudan

admin — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 18:55:00 +0000

South Africa will "seriously consider" sending more soldiers to Sudan as part of the new African Union-United Nations Peacekeeping force, Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad said on Thursday.

"We will give very serious consideration, I hope, I'm sure positive consideration to increase our presence within the hybrid force," Pahad said.

Just less than 600 SA National Defence Force soldiers and just over 100 SA Police Service officers were part of the current AU Mission in Sudan.

On Tuesday the UN Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution to establish the AU-UN Hybrid Operation in Darfur (Unamid).

Cabinet extends SANDF tours in Africa

admin — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 17:53:00 +0000

The South African Cabinet agreed on Tuesday to extend the deployment of South African National Defence Force (SANDF) soldiers in various peacekeeping missions on the African continent.

The deployments include 750 SANDF personnel in Sudan under the banner of the African Union Mission in Sudan, 1 264 in the Democratic Republic of Congo under the United Nations Mission in the DRC (Monuc) and 10 in Ethiopia and Eritrea under the UN and African Union.

The deployment of 22 SANDF members helping with integration and training in the DRC will also be extended by a year, government communications head Themba Maseko told a media briefing at Parliament after Cabinet's fortnightly meeting.

The meeting had also approved the deployment of five SANDF members to be part of the UN Political Mission in Nepal (Unmin) as military observers and staff officers.

"South Africa will sign a memorandum of understanding with the UN's department of peacekeeping operations to regulate our role in Unmin," Maseko said.

Source: Mail & Guardian Online

Is the SANDF properly equipped for its expanding peacekeeping role?

admin — Mon, 19 Mar 2007 20:07:00 +0000

In his State of the Nation address last month, President Thabo Mbeki stated, “[A]mong the greatest achievements of the peoples of Africa in the past two-and-a-half years has been the restoration of peace in the Great Lakes region. We are proud, as South Africans, of the role that our people have played in helping to bring this about – from the young men and women in our National Defence Force to employees of public and private institutions . . . we will continue to work with the sister people of the DRC, as well as Burundi, the Comoros and Sudan, in particular, to ensure that the condition of peace and stability thus far obtained translates without pause into concerted action for economic reconstruction and social development. However . . . we cannot underplay the challenges that we face in dealing with the remaining areas of conflict . . . Our government will respond appropriately and as our capacity permits . . . ” Back in 1994, it looked as if the future role of the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) was to be a ‘self-defence’ force in the mould of Japan’s, restricted to the defence of home territory and with minimal counterattack capabilities.

Today, in dramatic contrast, the SANDF finds itself operating as an expeditionary force far from home, in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Burundi, and the Darfur region of the Sudan. Pretoria to Bujumbura in Burundi is a distance of 2 491 km, to Ndjamena in Chad (the hub for the Darfur operation) it is 4 430 km, while the distance from Berlin to Moscow is only 1 608 km.

Currently, it seems that South Africa has 1 300 military personnel in the DRC, 540 in Darfur, and 750 in Burundi, a total of 2 600; but the numbers in Burundi are being increased to about 1 500 and reinforcements are also being sent to Darfur, which means that, in the near future, South Africa will have some 4 500 troops deployed abroad.

These expeditionary missions are not, officially, combat operations.

SANDF stands ready, says Lekota

admin — Sat, 01 Apr 2006 01:08:00 +0000

The South African National Defence Force (SANDF) is not only ready to fulfil its mandate in all respects, but will continue to be even "readier" in the years ahead, Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota said on Friday.