India sending two teams to UN missions for Covid-19 effort

UNITED NATIONS: India is contributing two teams of

specialists

to fortify medical facilities in

UN peacekeeping operations

in South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to meet the Covid-19 challenge, according to India's UN mission.

New Delhi was responding to a request from UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres for assistance to scale-up

hospital facilities

managed by

Indian peacekeepers

in those countries to counter the Covid-19 outbreak there, the mission said on Friday.

"This gesture has been welcomed," it said. A team of 15 specialists will go later this month to Goma in DRC where the hospital run by India since January 2005 already has 90 Indians including 18 specialists, according to it.

The main command and control centre for the UN peacekeeping mission known as MONUSCO for the French acronym for

UN Organisation Stabilization Mission

in DRC is located in Goma. There are 2,030 Indian peacekeepers deployed with MONUSCO.

Another team of 15 specialists will go to Juba in South Sudan, where the Indian hospital with 77 Indians including 12 specialists has been running since 2016 with the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), which has 2,420 Indian peacekeepers.

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