U.N. chief meets DRC president: Ebola, MONUSCO top agenda

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on donor nations to give the money they’ve pledged to fight Ebola on Monday (September 2), saying further delays could mean ‘‘we lose the war against Ebola.’‘

Speaking on a visit to the President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Felix Tshisekedi in Kinshasa, Guterres said the UN had received only 15 percent of what it needed to fight the disease over the rest of this year.

More than 2000 people have died in the DRC over the last year, while the death in neighbouring Uganda of a 9-year-old girl who had tested positive for the virus after entering the country from Congo underscored the challenge medical teams face containing the disease in border territory with a highly mobile population.

Responders are also battling to overcome community mistrust and widespread security problems.

Guterres also called on ADF (Allied Democratic Forces) fighters in the DRC to lay down their arms and announced the United Nations would reinforce its peacekeeping operation in the country, the United Nations Organisation Stabilization Mission in the DR Congo (MONUSCO) whilst expanding cooperation with the DRC’s armed forces, to fight against what he called “acts of terrorism” in DRC.

REUTERS