Security Council told not to cut peacekeepers in the Central African Republic as Sudan's war spills across the border

20 October 2026

Valentine Rugwabiza, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for the Central African Republic and head of MINUSCA, told the Security Council that the mission should be maintained with adequate force levels and capabilities during its consolidation phase. MINUSCA, deployed in 2014, maintains more than 12,000 peacekeepers, and the Council must decide before mid-November whether to renew the mandate. The Secretary-General recommended a one-year extension that preserves rapid-intervention capabilities. On 30 June armed groups attacked Am-Dafock on the Sudan border, killing civilians and security force members, displacing 17,000 civilians and injuring six United Nations peacekeepers; the group held the town for five days before retreating into Sudan. Between June and September 26 serious incidents in the southeast were attributed to the Lord's Resistance Army, including 68 civilians abducted, around 40 of them children. Since July 2025, 1,907 fighters have been disarmed and demobilised. Nearly two million Central Africans, 31 per cent of the population, faced acute food insecurity between April and August, and the humanitarian plan was 46.6 per cent funded at the start of October.