MacKenna sallies forth

Rod has lit out of my gaff on his way to work with Alan Doss (a Cardiff boy I am reliably informed) at the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Mission fatalities to date: 81 military personnel, 9 military observers, 2 UN police, 11 international civilian, 23 local civilian; 126 total.

A vast country with immense economic resources, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) has been at the centre of what could be termed Africa's world war.

This has left it in the grip of a humanitarian crisis.

The five-year conflict pitted government forces, supported by Angola, Namibia and Zimbabwe, against rebels backed by Uganda and Rwanda. Despite a peace deal and the formation of a transitional government in 2003, the threat of civil war remains.

The war claimed an estimated three million lives, either as a direct result of fighting or because of disease and malnutrition. It has been called possibly the worst emergency to unfold in Africa in recent decades.

I take my hat off to him.