No charges in sexual abuse case involving French peacekeepers

A panel of French judges has decided not to bring charges against soldiers accused of having sexually abused children while on a peacekeeping mission in the Central African Republic, officials said on Friday.

Soldiers were sent to the country, a former French colony, in 2013 to help quell a sectarian conflict there, but allegations of sexual and physical violence by the troops have been an embarrassment for France.

They also have been an embarrassment for the United Nations, where rights investigators compiled a confidential report in 2014 about the allegations and the organization did not move quickly to rectify them. The French authorities became aware of the allegations only when the report was leaked to them.