The president of France, Francois Hollande, on Thursday said there would be no mercy shown to any French soldiers who were found to have abused children in the Central African Republic while deployed there as UN peacekeeping soldiers.

“If some soldiers have behaved badly, I will show no mercy,” Mr Hollande told reporters.

Earlier this week a leaked UN report found that young boys in a camp for internally displaced persons in CAR had made allegations against a number of soldiers that they had been sexually abused.

This is not the first time that allegations of sexual abuse have been made against UN peacekeeping soldiers.

Sri Lankan troops were expelled from Haiti for sexually abusing children in 2007, with 111 soldiers and 3 officers were repatriated back to Sri Lanka after being part of UN mission in Haiti and were accused of a string of sexual assaults, including rape of children as young as 7 years old. No prosecutions or punishments have taken place.

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Haitian lawyers condemn impunity for Sri Lankan soldiers (11 September 2011)

Child rape impunity no bar to UN peacekeeping deal with Sri Lanka (27 May 2011)

Sri Lanka forces fire into Haitian civilians (25 November 2009)

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