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ByCaraAnna The Associated Press UNITED NATIONS The 12-year-old girl said she had been raped by a foreign soldier, one of many who had come to Central Afri- can Republic to calm sec- tarian violence. So the mil- itary commander brought her in front of a dozen of his soldiers and asked: Can you identify him? She could not. And with that, the rape investigation was closed. A new push against what the U.N. secretary-general calls the "cancer" of peace- keeper sexual misconduct, after the issue flared again last week, has a troubling weakness: Countries' lack of interest in prosecuting their troops who serve in U.N. missions, even though the responsibility is theirs alone. Sometimes, U.N. offi- cials and observers say, little or no effort is made. "Of course, the girl was terrified," said Francoise Bouchet-Saulnier, the le- gal director of Medecins Sans Frontieres, who de- scribed the encounter and said it wasn't unique. The girl does not blame a U.N. peacekeeper for her sexual assault — multiple peace- keeping forces have been in the country — but four other children the organiza- tionhas treated in thecoun- try's capital, Bangui, do. The latest case emerged last week, when Amnesty International accused a U.N. police officer, part of a group it said was from Rwanda and Cameroon, of raping a 12-year-old Mus- lim girl. Fed up after a series of similar allegations, the U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon fired the head of the peacekeeping mission, a first. He also an- nounced measures to pres- sure member states for ac- countability, including the suspension of payments to countries for troops who face credible allegations of misconduct. On Monday, the U.N. mission in Congo tweeted a series of warnings, in- cluding an image of a girl on a bed next to a peace- keeper uniform with the words, "No sex with chil- dren!" The tweet was later deleted. The U.N. has no stand- ing army to police some of the world's most vul- nerable areas. It relies on 105,000 troops and police largely contributed by de- veloping countries from Africa and South Asia, who appreciate the $1,000- plus per person per month they receive in return. "Too many incidents go unreported," Ban told a special meeting of the Se- curity Council last week. "Too few cases are prose- cuted. ... A failure to pur- sue criminal accountabil- ity for sexual crimes is tan- tamount to impunity." The U.N. defines sexual abuse as "actual or threatened physical intrusion of a sexual nature," and it pro- hibits "exchange of money, employment, goods or ser- vices for sex." In a statement Tuesday, the Security Council said it shared Ban's outrage and said countries have the "primary responsibility" to investigate and prose- cute their troops. Getting member states to pursue cases has been a challenge. This summer, the U.N.'s internal oversight office re- ported that several coun- tries hadn't said whether they planned to investigate alleged sexual miscon- duct by their peacekeep- ers, even though they're supposed to say so within 10 days. AFRICA UN: Some sexual abuse charges against peacekeepers ignored By Nattasuda Anusonadisai and Papitchaya Boonngok The Associated Press BANGKOK A central Bang- kok shrine where a deadly bomb blast killed 20 peo- ple reopened Wednesday to the public as authorities searched for a man seen in a grainy security video who they say was the prime sus- pect in an attack authori- ties called the worst in the country's history. A stream of people ar- rived at the Erawan Shrine at one of the capital's bus- iest intersections. People knelt in prayer and lite in- cense at the shrine and laid flowers. Police said they had no doubt that the man seen in the video wearing a yellow shirt and carrying a large backpack was responsi- ble for the attack. But au- thorities gave no indication that they were aware of his whereabouts. "The yellow shirt guy is not just the suspect. He is the bomber," police spokes- man Lt. Gen. Prawut Thavornsiri told The Asso- ciated Press on Tuesday. Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha called the shrine bombing near a busy inter- section that also wounded more than 120 "the worst incident that has ever hap- pened in Thailand," and he promised to track down those responsible. "There have been minor bombs or just noise, but this time they aimed for inno- cent lives," Prayuth said. "They want to destroy our economy, our tourism." Bangkok was rattled again Tuesday when an- other pipe bomb blew up at the Sathorn Pier, which is used by tourists, although no one was hurt. Prawut released several photos of the man, with and without the backpack, on social media. The im- ages were apparently taken from closed-circuit video at the shrine before the bomb exploded. Video posted separately on Thai media appeared to show the same man sitting on a bench at the shrine, taking off the backpack and leaving it behind as he walked away. Without elaborating, the prime minister said, "Today we have seen the closed-cir- cuit footage, we saw some suspects, but it wasn't clear. We have to find them first." Prayuth said the govern- ment will expedite "all in- vestigative efforts to find the perpetrators and bring them to justice." The bomb, which police say was made from a pipe and weighed 3 kilograms (more than 6 pounds), went off about 7 p.m. in an upscale area filled with tourists, office workers and shoppers. No one has claimed responsibility. Prawut said Tuesday's blast at the Sathorn Pier frequented by tourist boats also was caused by a pipe bomb and could be related to the shrine attack. Police said the bomb was thrown from the Tak- sin Bridge and fell into the Chao Phraya River, where it exploded. Security video showed a sudden blast of water over a walkway at the pier as bystanders ran for safety. The Erawan Shrine is dedicated to the Hindu god Brahma, but is extremely popular among Thailand's Buddhists as well as Chi- nese tourists. Although Thailand is predominantly Buddhist, it has enormous Hindu influence on its re- ligious practices and lan- guage. Thai authorities iden- tified five victims as Thai and four as Chinese — two of them from Hong Kong — along with two Malaysians and one Singaporean, and said the nationalities of the other eight victims re- mained unknown. The British Foreign Of- fice said one victim was a British citizen named Viv- ian Chan who lived in Hong Kong. It was not immedi- ately clear whether she was one of the two Hong Kong victims identified by Thai officials. Officials at Lon- don's BPP University said she had studied there. Defense Minister Prawit Wongsuwan said authori- ties had no idea an attack had been planned. "We didn't know about this ahead of time. We had no intelligence on this at- tack," he said. GRAINY SECURITY VIDEO Ba ng ko k bo mb b la st s it e reopens to the public MARKBAKER—THEASSOCIATEDPRESS Police investigators work Tuesday near the statue of Phra Phrom, which is the Thai interpretation of the Hindu god Brahma, at the Erawan Shrine the morning a er an explosion in Bangkok. ROYAL THAI POLICE A man wearing a yellow T-shirt is shown near the Erawan Shrine before an explosion occurred in Bangkok. AUGUST SPECIAL: Starta3-monthbusinessbuilderadbefore August 31, and get a FOURTH MONTH FREE! Gayla Eckels: geckels@redbluffdailynews.com (530) 737-5044 Suzy Noble: snoble@redbluffdailynews.com (530) 737-5056 Attention Business Operators: YOUR BUSINESS' AD IN THE DAILY NEWS EVERY PUBLISHING DAY OF THE MONTH FOR AS LITTLE AS $3.56 PER DAY! 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