Welcome to the latest issue of Congo Panorama Magazine, the Democratic Republic of Congo's N01 voice in the English speaking world...There's no progress without struggle!
RWANDA AND UGANDA COME UNDER FIRE AT THE SECURITY COUNCIL FOR ATTEMPTING TO PERTURB ELECTIONS IN CONGO, WHICH ATTEMPT ENDED IN FAILURE
The Congolese army backed by U.N. peacekeepers killed four Rwanda and Uganda backed dissident fighters on Sunday 29.01.2006, pushing them out of a town they had overrun in a four-day offensive that has forced more than 50,000 people from their homes. A senior Congolese army officer said on Friday that 21 attackers and two government soldiers were killed near Rutshuru.
Fighters loyal to renegade ex-army commander Laurent Nkunda (a Tutsi who came as a refugee in Congo), who reject a peace process to end Democratic Republic of Congo's five-year war, began an offensive in the east of the country on Thursday and have briefly occupied a number of towns and villages in cat-and-mouse fighting with the army.
Nkunda and his men are of Rwandan Tutsi descent and they fear restoring central government authority under the peace process will rob them of influence built up during the 1998-2003 war when the main pro-Rwandan rebel group controlled the area.
Meanwhile, the French daily Le Monde on Monday 24.01.2006 that the eight UN soldiers from Guatemala recently killed in the battle in eastern Congo were involved in a pro-Uganda operation to finsih the LRA, attacking them from the Congolese territory, from Kisangani. Two British secret agents took part in the operation spying for Uganda. How long have they been in Kisangani?
DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO: THE "YES" VOTE WIN OVER THE "NO" AS PEOPLE BACK THE NEW CONSTITUTION. THATS IS A TATE OF DEMOCRACY SINCE THE SAVAGE ASSASINATION BY "WESTERN AGENTS" OF PATRICE LUMUMBA IN 1961, THE FIRST ELECTED CONGOLESE ELECTED EVER SINCE.
Final result (11.01.2006): 84.31% for "yes" against 15.59% for the "No". So, Voters in the Democratic Republic of Congo have overwhelmingly backed a new post-war constitution in a referendum, early results indicate.
This opens the way for the first multi-party poll in the former Zaire in more than 40 years.
The date has been set for the first democratic elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo for more than four decades.
The Congolese Government has set April 29 as the date for parliamentary elections and the first round of the presidential poll.
A run-off for the presidency between the top two candidates will then be held on 1st June if the vote is close.
Initial trends in the Democratic Republic of Congo's constitutional referendum showed overwhelming support for the document, which, if approved, should clear the way for general elections in 2006.
Thus 78.47 percent of the nation's 24 million registered voters have voted in favour of the draft constitution, compared with 21.03 percent opposing, said Apolinnaire Malu Malu, chairman of the independent electoral commission.
Apollinaire Malu Malu, the electoral commission chief, put the turnout at 61.97%.
The preliminary results were based on a tally of 33.8 percent of votes counted in 12,200 of the nation's 36,028 polling stations.
In Kinshasa, the capital, 88.52 percent of the votes have been counted, of which 50.40 percent approve of the constitution and 49.55 percent oppose it.
If you intend to see the new Hollywood film KING KONG… beware.
Signorney Weaver and other celebrities are using the timing of the film's release as a venue to raise funds for gorilla conservation in Africa, especially for the Diane Fossey Gorilla Fund. 5 millions have been killed in congo in this war of aggression. It is well to protect the apes. What about the people?
KIZZA BESIGYE: "MUSEVENI SHOULD BE ON TRIAL FOR INVADING CONGO"
Ugandan opposition leader Kizza Besigye has vowed to defeat the government in elections, after his release on bail from detention over terrorism charges.
Dr Besigye who was once President Museveni's personal physician and whose wife used to be Museveni's girlfriend, said he had been held illegally and that President Yoweri Museveni should be the one in court.
"This was proved by a world court ruling that Uganda was wrong to invade the Democratic Republic of Congo," he said.
Dr Besigye was arrested in November after returning home from four years' exile to contest February's polls.
The International Court of Justice ruled last month that Uganda must pay compensation to DR Congo for looting during the 1998-2003 war and the two countries are negotiating on the level of compensation.
Dr Besigye faces treason, rape, firearms and terrorism charges, which he says are politically motivated.
"Taking our troops to Congo without the authority of parliament as required by the constitution where thousands of our soldiers died. What more treason can there be?", Dr Besigye asked a news conference at his Kampala home before heading east of the capital to attend a campaign rally.
"It should be Museveni in the docks and not Kizza Besigye." Dr Besigye, a former close ally of Mr Museveni, added that he did not advocate violence.
"I have been warning about the possibility of violence in Uganda occasioned by the actions of government. The person who points a finger at the danger is not the cause of the danger."
Cornered, Uganda plans to negotiate with the Congolese government over the implementation of the ruling of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which has found Kampala guilty of plundering Congolese resources.
The East African (Nairobi), December 28, 2005
But even as Uganda studies the 102-page ruling, Ugandan Foreign Affairs Permanent Secretary Julius Onen said he expects the issue to be settled without Uganda having to pay any money. He also said that negotiations between the two parties will start in about four months' time.
"The pronouncement by the court is purely a declaration and the essence of implementation is a negotiation process. I am sure we shall find a lot of common grounds with Congo, especially since we are neighbours, Mr Onen told The EastAfrican.
He added that once Uganda finishes internalising the ruling, it will initiate diplomatic contact with Congolese authorities to commence the negotiations.
The ICJ also ruled that the Congo government was under obligation to make reparations to Uganda, after upholding one of three counter-claims by Kampala.
In its ruling on December 19, the ICJ said Uganda violated the principle of non-use of force in international relations and the principle of non-intervention when it occupied parts of Congo and supported Congolese rebel groups.
The court also found that Uganda's armed forces, "committed acts of killing, torture and other forms of inhumane treatment on the Congolese civilian population, destroyed villages and civilian buildings, failed to distinguish between civilian and military targets and to protect the civilian population in fighting with other combatants as well as training child soldiers."
The Uganda People's Defence Forces (UPDF) was found guilty of inciting ethnic conflict and failing to take measures to put an end to the conflict in the areas it occupied, hence Uganda violated its obligations under international human-rights laws and international humanitarian laws.
The court directed that Uganda should pay reparations to the Congolese government, though it did not specify the amount. Instead, the two governments were to agree on the amount through negotiations.
When Congo filed its case at The Hague in 1999, it jointly sued Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi, all of whom it accused of violating its territorial integrity, plundering its resources and committing human-rights violations against its people.
However, Rwanda and Burundi said since they had not ratified the ICJ convention, the court could not try them on January 15, 2001. As a result, Congo withdrew the case against them. Uganda submitted to the jurisdiction of the UCJ in 1963 so it could not invoke the same defence.
In July 2002, however, the Congolese government filed a fresh case against Rwanda. In its initial pleadings, Rwanda contested the powers of the ICJ to hear the case and requested that it be removed from the list of those to be heard by the UN institution. By 15 votes to one, the court ruled that it could not grant Rwanda's request that the case be removed from the list.
UGANDA MUST COMPENSATE THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO. RWANDA AND BURUNDI MUST BE NEXT
Uganda is accused of massacring Congolese civilians
The International Court of Justice has ruled that Uganda must pay compensation to the Democratic Republic of Congo for looting during the 1998-2003 war.
A government spokesman said DR Congo will seek up to $10bn in compensation.
The Hague-based court also found Uganda responsible for human rights abuses.
DR Congo has accused Uganda of invading its territory and massacring civilians. Several African states were involved in the war, which left 3m people dead.
Uganda has said its actions were meant to protect national security along its borders.
DR Congo brought the case saying its sovereignty had been violated, and demanding compensation for plundered minerals and other resources.
'Terror'
"We are very happy that international law has finally listened to our case," Congolese government spokesman Henri Mova Sakanyi told Reuters news agency.
He added Kinshasa would seek between $6bn and $10bn in compensation from Uganda.
ICJ president Shi Jiuyong told the court Ugandan troops had "created an atmosphere of terror pervading the life of the Congolese people".
Uganda pulled its troops out of eastern DR Congo in 2003, but Kinshasa says its neighbour still supplies arms to Ugandan warlords who continue to steal the country's natural resources of gold, diamonds and timber.
This year, the United Nations accused Uganda and Rwanda of violating an arms embargo by shipping weapons across DR Congo's borders.
Democratic Republic of Congo voting on constitution
People in Democratic Republic of Congo have begun voting on a new constitution (17-18 December 2005), though many complain they do not know what it contains.
If it is approved, the text would pave the way for the country's first democratic poll in June 2006, after decades of Mobutu's despotic rule and a war of aggression.
REFERENDUM: PRESIDENT KABILA ASKS FOR CITIZENS TO VOTE ‘YES’
The president of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Joseph Kabila, has asked his citizens to vote ‘yes’ at the referendum of next December 18.
“The ‘no’ vote would be catastrophic, obliging us to review our programs on the elections and reopen some sort of negotiation,” said Kabila to journalists in Kinshasa. In ten days citizens of the former Zaire will vote to approve or reject the new Constitution, which should lead to elections in 2006 and end the long transition process following the 1998-2003 conflict.
A possible failure of the new text – which offers the adoption of a semi-presidential system in a unitary state that is strongly decentralized – might require new negotiations, and especially a revision of the ‘global and inclusive’ accord that ended in December 2002 – at least on paper – the so called First African World War. For years the conflict drew in the Congo armies of six countries of the region causing no fewer than 2.5 to 3 million deaths, from the severe armed clashes and from disease and famine (Misna).
MUSEVENI GETS A GRILL
Museveni is grilled at the Commonwealth Summit in Malta, not for having committed crimes against humanity in Congo (5 millions massacred by troops from Rwanda and Uganda) and looting Congo's natural and mineral resources; but for having jailed an opposition leader Kizza Besigye.
This year, Britain and other donors withheld some aid in protest at moves to change the constitution and allow him to seek a third term. And Museveni's wife is standing as an MP.
Concerns Grow About Terrorist Fall-Out From DRC Gold Trade
SouthScan (London)
December 8, 2005
The UN has again publicized the destabilizing effect of the illegal traffic in gold across the border from the DR Congo to Uganda. But inside Uganda, which is increasingly dependent on its gold exports, concerns are growing about control of the revenues and that they could be finding their way into terrorist organisations.
A UN report in August revealed a vigorous war economy in the east of the DRC based on gold smuggling to Uganda. Former warlords, even while ostensibly integrated into the new national army, are running it in Ituri province, but according to the UN investigators they are in harness with a significant number of the DR Congo's business leaders.
Now a number of international companies have stopped purchasing gold from Uganda. In August Metal Technologies SA of Neuchatel, Switzerland, and some South African companies instituted a ban after reports from international human rights groups that Uganda takes the gold and gives military supplies to eight militia groups in the eastern Congo.
But at the same time concern is mounting in international intelligence agencies that Kampala is attracting terrorist organizations interested in the profits of the trade.
Economic hopes
Five companies are involved in gold trade, Uganda Commercial Impex being the largest. Government statistics show gold exports as $60m, though Human Rights Watch in its July 5 report has noted big discrepancies in the figures.
The block on the trade will hit Ugandan economic aspirations, though Uganda Commercial Impex's manager, Jamnadas Vasanji Lodhio, says the Congolese would suffer more as Kampala is best equipped to handle this type of trade.
However, the cancellations will affect the gold trading company Victoria, which is jointly owned by Maj. Muhozi Kainerugaba, second-in-command of the Presidential Guard Brigade and Museveni's son. Others are Maj-Gen. Salim Saleh, Muhozi's uncle and Jovia Saleh, his wife.
Ugandan economic hopes are being increasingly pinned on gold and diamonds, which have brought in substantial amounts of foreign exchange. Both have been crucial in the improvement of balance of payments and Uganda has pinned its hopes on the trade, given the poor revenues from coffee and the likelihood of that the East African Customs Union will hit Ugandan revenues hard.
Museveni has also relied on gold and diamonds to stabilize his regime and divert restless Ugandan People's Defence Force (UPDF) officers into business, and also as an insurance against a future suspension of aid by Western countries over his political policies.
The ministry of finance budget for this year shows that in a dramatic shift internally generated revenues will account for 60 percent of government revenues while donor funds will be only 40 percent. Gold and diamonds have also enabled Museveni to re-equip his army.
The government has to some extent been prepared for a ban on the trade. For instance, it has made painstaking efforts to conceal its diamond trade, and diamond figures are not reflected in government books though according to dealers no less than $1.3m worth of the stones pass through Kampala every week.
Diamond centre
Kampala is increasingly becoming a regional capital for the diamond trade, which is dominated by Lebanese traders. One of them is Abraham Nazzeem Abas whose firm, 'Mister Cash', is run from a room in the Kampala Sheraton.
Abdullah Dakhallar runs 'Piccadilly Import and Export' in Bugolobi, a rich Kampala suburb. They run other businesses such as 'Delight Bakery' and 'Viva Cardin', apparently as a cover.
Their connection with the Ugandan ruling family came to light in the Judge David Porter commission of inquiry, which government set up to counterbalance reports released by the UN panel of experts. During one of the hearings, Jovia Saleh told commissioners that she jointly owns Al-Tarboush Lebanese restaurant with Nazzeem, though the restaurant has suspended operations.
More revelations about the first family connection appeared in a police statement filed by Dakhallar, who was robbed of $500,000 in broad daylight in Kampala. The file, which is dated July 15 and 20, is still strictly confidential but it stated that Nazzeem runs the diamond trade on behalf of Victoria's owners and that Mister Cash is actually owned by Maj-Gen. Salim Saleh and Maj-Gen. James Kazini.
Israeli intelligence
Alarm has been growing in Western agencies that some Lebanese businessmen could have double loyalties and may be working with international terrorist outfits. With the help of Israeli intelligence - Israeli businessmen were also involved - Ugandan security arrested Shafi Muhammed, who was leader of a Hezbollah cell in Uganda. His brother escaped. Information extracted from him was that he went to Tehran to study theology but later was recruited by Iranian intelligence where he studied methods of sabotage.
Another fear is the reappearance of Al-Qaeda in the region with Western intelligence agencies claiming it is seeking to exploit networks established by Hezbollah.
Now Ugandan authorities are concerned that the gold and diamonds trade from the Congo could backfire and harm the country. An assessment by the head of operations of the joint anti-terrorism squad indicates that the Allied Democratic Front (ADF), which is regenerating, is now fully integrated into an Al-Qaeda network. According to Col. Patrick Kansiima, operations officer of the Joint Anti-Terrorism Task Force, ADF targets Western interests in Kampala, Nairobi, Johannesburg, Harare and Luanda, in addition to targeting the Ugandan government.
Security around senior government officers has been tightened. Museveni has expanded his presidential guard to 12,000 and his motorcade has reached 50 vehicles including armoured personnel carriers and cannon fitted armoured vehicles. According to local reports he recently spent $4m to secure his home.
A JOKE IN CONGO: AMNESTY LAW PASSED BY MOBUTUISTS AND PRO-RWANDA MPS. IT WON'T BE PROMULGATED AS FAR AS WE KNOWAS THE SUPREME COURT HAS NOW REJECTED IT!
30 Nov 2005
KINSHASA, 30 November (IRIN) - The lower house of parliament in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the National Assembly, passed on Tuesday a law granting amnesty to people who have been blamed for acts of war as well as political offences.
The vote was taken without MPs from President Joseph Kabila's party who feared that a group of people behind the murder of his father, former president Laurent-Desire Kabila, would benefit from the new law. The law would be applicable to offences committed between August 1996 and June 2003.
Some 248 MPs approved the bill, with six abstaining. The House comprises 500 MPs, some of whom are former members of rival rebel groups who have since joined the transitional government.
MPs from Kabila's Parti du peuple pour la reconstruction et le développement (PPRD) walked out before the vote.
"We couldn't stay in the assembly room and support the impunity for the murderers of President Laurent Kabila," Safou Sindani, one of the PPRD MPs, said.
During the vote on the government-sponsored bill, the MPs who remained in the chamber dropped a clause that stipulated that amnesty may not be granted to those who murder a head of state.
"We have dropped the clause because we wanted the law to be impartial," Moise Nyarugabo, leader of the MPs from the former rebel group Rassemblement Congolais pour la démocratie (RCD), said.
A bodyguard shot dead the older Kabila on 16 January 2001 in his office in the Congolese capital, Kinshasa. Some 100 people were found guilty during a subsequent murder trial, 30 of whom await death sentences.
Problems could arise with the implementation of the law, following the refusal by MPs from Kabila's party to take part in the vote. According to these MPs, the transitional constitution allows the president to raise a complaint before the Constitutional Court if he thinks that a law adopted by the Parliament is unconstitutional.
The amnesty law is supposed to be in place before the holding of a constitutional referendum on 18 December and general elections in June 2006 (Congopanorama/Irin News).
***URGENT: "The Constant Gardener", a film that depicts how pharmaceutical companies are litterally committing genocide in Africa". Recommended. Please go and watch it! But don't just watch history, make history(...)
"THE PEACEKEEPERS" SORTING OUT THE CONGO - A DOCUMENTARY FILM ON UN PEACEKKEPING IN CONGO
"Ethnic strife" is one of those catchall phrases that essentially depoliticizes (thus delegitimizes) all Third World struggle. That said, you can't fault the United Nations for trying to keep violence, under any name, under control whenever possible. It's an irritatingly dragging yet fascinating process captured in Paul Cowan's latest National Film Board documentary, The Peacekeepers.
Shot between the summer of 2002 and spring of 2004, as the Democratic Republic of Congo appeared to be coming out of a five-year civil war (involving nine nations and killing 3.5 million people), The Peacekeepers juxtaposes the bureaucratic waltz required to convince the "international community" to give more money and resources to the UN peacekeeping mission with the worsening conditions and periodic massacres in the central African nation.
While filming, new attacks (which some feared were backed by the Ugandan army) in Ituri, Congo threatened the peace process, and some warned of a potential Rwanda-like genocide. All this while total global attention was on Iraq and the UN's legitimacy was being questioned from all camps. The opening scene of the documentary shows George W. Bush addressing the UN in September 2002, claiming only it could decide whether the UN would remain relevant in the 21st century.
One of the crucial messages of The Peacekeepers is that the UN will become irrelevant when its member states decide to make it so. Which means we must all shake
off the fear of losing lives while standing by one of the UN's basic tenets: to uphold global peace.
While Cowen gives us a foot in the door of the convoluted (and frankly messy) UN headquarters in New York City, don't expect to come out with any solid understanding of Congo's politics. This film is about the United Nations, and the red tape that too often keeps it from doing its best.
With unprecedented access to the United Nations Department of Peacekeeping, The Peacekeepers provides an intimate and dramatic portrait of the struggle to save "a failed state."
The film follows the determined and often desperate manoeuvres to avert another Rwandan disaster, this time in the Democratic Republic of Congo (the DRC).
Focusing on the UN mission, the film cuts back and forth between the United Nations headquarters in New York and events on the ground in the DRC. We are with the peacekeepers in the 'Crisis Room' as they balance the risk of loss of life on the ground with the enormous sums of money required from uncertain donor countries. We are with UN troops as the northeast Congo erupts and the future of the DRC, if not all of central Africa, hangs in the balance.
In the background, but often impinging on peacekeeping decisions, are the painful memory of Rwanda, the worsening crisis in Iraq, global terrorism and American hegemony in world affairs. As Secretary General Kofi Annan tells the General Assembly at the conclusion of The Peacekeepers: "History is a harsh judge. The world will not forgive us if we do nothing." Whether the world's peacekeeper did enough remains to be seen.
***SANDF TROOPS CAUGHT UP IN DRC SEX ABUSE
Sapa, October 13 2005
By Boyd Webb
Kinshasa - The South African military operating in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is responsible for almost a third of sexual misconduct complaints against the United Nations peacekeeping force in the country.
Nicola Dahrendorf, UN director of the office for addressing sexual exploitation and abuse, said of the 95 accusations levelled at foreign military personnel, 30 were against South African National Defence Force troops.
"Eight were substantiated and repatriated back to South Africa," she said.
These figures, however, did not include a further four cases involving seven South African soldiers who were alleged to have committed sexual misconduct crimes after September.
"These must be substantiated," she said, explaining that of those already proven guilty, one was a warrant officer and six were non-commissioned officers.
Dahrendorf was briefing members of the South African parliamentary defence committee who are in Kinshasa, the DRC on an oversight visit.
***THIS IS IRONICAL! KAGAME ARMING THE RASTAS IN EASTERN CONGO TO BLOCK THE REPATRIATION OF HUTU MILITIA HE ACCUSES OF HAVING PERPETRADED THE 1994 GENOCIDE IN RWANDA.
It is Colette Braeckman, writing for le Soir, a Belgian daily, who revealed it on 28.10.2005.
***THE RWANDAN TUTSI ARMY IS RESPONSIBLE FOR CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY IN CONGO
More than 300 bodies have been found by the Congolese army in 7 mass graves in Kirinda, in the territory of Rutshuru, in Nord-Kivu province, Democratic Republic of Congo. The Congolese soldiers now deployed in that zone, discovered the mass graves while digging pit latrines in the area.
The victims are Hutu refugees, mainly women and children, killed, according to eye witnesses and survivors, on 30.10. 1996 by the Tutsi army of Paul Kagame in agust of revenge when they helped Luarent Kabila overthrow the dictator Mobutu in the former Zaire.
Army troops unearthed seven mass graves in eastern Congo believed to contain the bodies of hundreds of Rwandan exiles and Congolese citizens killed at the start of Congo's civil war in 1996.
Local residents informed authorities last month of the graves' locations in Rutshuru, about 50 kilometers (30 miles) north of Goma, said Jacqueline Chenard, a U.N. spokeswoman.
During the past two weeks, skulls, bones and human tissue have been exhumed from the sites by the Congolese army, and a U.N. team composed of human rights officials and peacekeepers was investigating the discovery, Chenard said.
Survivors of the killings said that more than 300 people were slaughtered with guns and machetes by Congolese rebels backed by Rwandan soldiers, Chenard said. The Congolese rebels were led by Laurent Kabila, the late father of President Joseph Kabila.
A U.N. peacekeeping official who visited the sites, however, said those killed were believed to have been massacred by Rwandan army soldiers who invaded eastern Congo in 1996 to hunt down Rwandan Hutu militiamen and former soldiers who together orchestrated Rwanda's 1994 genocide, which claimed the lives of an estimated 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus. The peacekeeping official said he had seen the remains of about 35 bodies at the sites. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the press publicly.
Human rights groups and residents of both countries said that Rwandan troops killed thousands of Rwandan Hutus -- combatants and their families -- as they advanced across Congo in 1996-1997, propelling Laurent Kabila to power.
BBC, 4.10.2005: DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO TROOPS TO UGANDA BORDER
DR Congo's military had been put on full alert. Several hundred troops have been airlifted by the UN to a remote corner of the Democratic Republic of Congo to deal with Ugandan rebels on its soil.
The presence of Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels on Congolese territory has triggered a diplomatic row with Uganda.
Last week, Uganda threatened to send its soldiers into DR Congo after them.
But DR Congo has warned that such a move would pose a threat to international peace and security and called for the UN to impose sanctions.
In 1998, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi invaded Congo, a war of invasion in which an estimated five million people were killed.
'Full alert'
"We have transported 300 Congolese soldiers to Aba in our helicopters and another 200 are on the way there by road," United Nations military spokesman Thierry Provendier said, Reuters reports.
The force will number 1,000 men by the end of this week, he said.
A deadline set by the Congolese government for foreign militias to leave the country expired on Friday.
Meanwhile, the BBC's Will Ross in Kampala says trucks full of Ugandan soldiers and military hardware have been moved to the Congolese border.
The Ugandan army says this is a precautionary measure to prevent LRA rebels in DR Congo from attacking Ugandan civilians.
"Congo will never allow Ugandan troops to cross inside Congolese territory," said Mulegwa Zinhindula, Congolese presidential adviser
But Mulegwa Zinhindula, a security adviser to the Congolese president, told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme that DR Congo's military had been put on full alert.
Last week, Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni said if the Congolese authorities failed to disarm LRA members, the Ugandan army would enter DR Congo to do so.
"Uganda has no right to say it will invade DR Congo when there are existing mechanisms between us for resolving respective problems," Mr Zinhindula said.
"Congo will never allow Ugandan troops to cross inside Congolese territory," he said.
In a letter to the UN Security Council on Monday, DR Congo's UN ambassador Atoki Ileka asked for sanctions to be imposed on Uganda including an arms embargo and the suspension of international aid.
Mr Zinhindula denied DR Congo was attempting to inflame the situation by referring the matter to the Security Council.
It is unclear how many LRA rebels are in DR Congo, but Mr Zinhindula said quoted figures of 400 were exaggerated by the Ugandans.
***MUSEVENI AND KAGAME THREATEN TO RE-INVADE CONGO IN ORDER TO LOOT MORE MINERALS AND DERAIL THE ELECTORAL PROCESS THERE
For six years, Rwandan and Uganda occupied Congo under the pretext of flshing out their respective rebels groups who represented a threat for their national security. It turned out that these masters of razzia, backed by the greatest financiers of this world were in Congo in order to loot minerals. For twenty years, Museveni failed to finish the LRA. Now, BOUT 400 Ugandan rebels from the Lord's Resistance Army recently crossed the border and are in Congo. The UN Mission in Congo and the Congolese army are desarming them.
"If the international community does not come in to do it, we shall go there," Museveni told a news conference in the Ugandan capital, Kampala.
If Uganda, Rwanda, or any other "powerful country" that backs them, launches an attack on Congo, Congo will fight.
The LRA has just attacked the Ugandan army in the heartland of Museveni's country. In Teso, that is. Congo is not Museveni's scape goat.
XINHUA reported on 2.10.2005 that the LRA attacked in Angica and Iyalakwe, district of Amuria, in the Teso region.
***NEWSPAPER DIPLOMACY ?THIS HAPPENS ONLY IN UGANDA
Two groups of LRA rebels (400 men) had travelled across Sudan to the DR Congo border, one of them led by Commander Otti, Ugandan Defence Minister Amama Mbabazi told the press without first contacting the Governement of the democratic Republic of Congo through diplomatic means, looking down on Congo as usual. But Congo does not lack intelligence services.
DR Congo government spokesman Henri Mova Sakanyi denied the authorities had received any asylum request from Vincent Otti.
"We have not received any asylum request concerning Ugandan rebels nor have we got any request for the extradition of LRA rebels on Congolese soil," he told the AFP news agency.
"Otti's group has declared their presence in the DRC and have requested political asylum," he said, after ordering the deployment of 10,000 Ugandan soldiers near de border with Congo.
"I am waiting to hear their [the DR Congo government's] response."
A source close to Democratic Republic of Congo President Joseph Kabila called the presence of Ugandan soldiers on Congo's border "a distraction from pressure being applied on Museveni because of his meddling in Congo and attempts to prolong his presidency at home".
ITURI: NEW REBEL GROUP SUPPORTED BY RWANDA AND UGANDA DISTRIBUTES ARMS DESPITE UN EMBARGO
The self-styled MRC (Congolese Revolutionary Movement) apparently distributed arms and cash to militias active in Ituri in the past days in Bambu, around 50km from Bunia, east Dmocratic Republic of Congo.
The news was communicated to MISNA by western sources, specifying that the armed group ?formed recently by elements that did not participate in the disarmament that regarded a large part of the militias involved in the war 1998-2003 ?is stocking up arms, despite a United Nations embargo throughout DR-Congo.
Based on available information, the new “recruits??reportedly including government soldiers stationed in Ituri ?were consigned around $100 in cash. If confirmed, this would represent further evidence that the movement ?whose origin is for the moment unknown ?benefits from significant external support, with probable ties in Uganda and Rwanda, already directly involved in backing rival militias active in Ituri during and after the conflict.
The activities of this new armed group ?which first emerged under three months ago ?are taking place in zones not controlled by the MONUC (UN Mission in DR-Congo), which counts over 5,000 peacekeepers in Ituri, nor the Congolese regular armed forces.
Also the MONUC has reported sporadic attacks by combatants of the MRC. There is also strong concern over the discontent of thousands of former combatants of Ituri, where in the past year some 12-13,000 militiamen were demobilised. In response to an inquiry conducted by the Radio Okapi broadcast of the MONUC, many said they are ready to take up arms again due to the failed implementation ?in their view ?of measures foreseen by the disarmament programme: a monthly salary of around 50 Euro and other interventions for their reintegration in society.
THE TRUTH ABOUT THE CUREENT RULING TUTSI ELITE IN RWANDA
1. First of all, you need to know that "The International Forum for Truth and Justice in the Great Lakes Region of Africa" recently filed a lawsuit in a Spanish court, based on years of research, against Paul Kagame and other Rwandan military leaders. The suit accuses them of massive war crimes in the series of conflicts that engulfed Central Africa following the RPF invasion of Rwanda from Uganda in 1990.
2. Charles Onana wrote a book telling the truth about the génocide in Rwanda, detailing the role the Tutsi played in the genocide from the time Kagame shot the plane onward. Kagame sued him and Kagame lost the case in the High Court in Paris.
3. The Rwandan military led by Paul Kagame has persecuted Hutus and Tutsis alike both inside and outside of Rwanda. Thousands of Hutu refugees and returnees to Rwanda are said to have been killed over the past several years.
UN High Commission for Refugees investigator Robert Gersony in September 1994 produced the first report about Rwandan Tutsi forces committing massive atrocities against Hutus. The UN in New York buried the report. By some estimates, hundreds of thousands of Hutu refugees were hunted down and murdered by Rwandan and Ugandan militaries that invaded Congo (then Zaire) in 1996. New York Times journalist Howard French reported the "counter-genocide" against Hutus as early as 1997: at least 80% were women and children, and 50% were believed to be under 14 years old.
4.Paradoxically, the Rwanda regime is accused of collaborating with the FDLR's resource-extraction operations, even while intervening in Congo to hunt them down, accusing them of being filled with "genocidiares"--veterans of the Interahamwe militias that carried out mass slaughter of Hutus in 1994.
4. As for the French Government, the Congo Panorama has never campaigned to wash the French of their responsibility in Rwanda and in other tragedies in Africa, such as supporting Mobutu for years. The French sent a contigent of their troops in Ituri under the “Opération Artemis? but nothing has changed there because mercenaries, militia, Rwandan and Ugandan troops... all supported by multinationals are still looting and killing in Ituri. When the Frech soldiers left, they gave all the weapons they used to the Ugandan army.
But the Congo Panorama finds the report of the French Judge Louis de Bruguière very accurate, a report that cornered Kagame et co. Truth always comes out. Where is Carla Del Ponte, the Swiss Judge first appointed to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, based in Arusha, Tanzania?. Why was she removed from Arusha to the Hague? Is it not because she wanted to leave no stone unturned, including on the RPF side for their role in the genocide?
5. How many people were killed by the RPF prior to Habyarimana's plane being shot down? It is needless to remind our readers that the RPF by then had invaded half of Rwanda from Uganda, killing and looting. How can RPF invade half of Rwanda and tell the world that nobody was killed?
6. .Who killed Brigadier Rugyema the first RPF leader, tipped to become president and why?
7. Eye witnesses including Ruzibiza a Tutsi RPF soldier who was there have confirmed that Kagame shot down President Habyarimana's plane, killing him, most of his generals, the Burundian President Cyprien Ntaryamira who also was onboard and the whole French crew. Why is that truth hidden in all the documentaries, reports and films about the 1994 civil war in Rwanda?
8. Statistics say there were about one and half million minority Tutsi before the genocide living in Rwanda. If one million were massacred during the genocide, then does that mean there are only half a million Tutsi left in Rwanda today?
9. Many people who go to visit the Memorial in Rwanda are told that all the kept skulls there are those of massacred Tutsi during the genocide. Is that not difficult to tell since nobody under the sun can distinguish the skull of a Hutu from that of a Tutsi, the skull of a Congolese from that of a Rwandan? Are all the bodies and skulls of most of the 5 millions massacred by Tutsi troops in Congo not still unaccounted for?
THESE ARE THE FUNDAMENTAL QUESTIONS THAT NEED TO BE ADDRESSED!
UGANDAN ARMY CALLED BRUTAL - LIKE ITS FANATICS
KAMPALA, Sept 20 (AFP)
The Ugandan army is as guilty as the brutal Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels in abusing civilians devastated by nearly two decades of conflict in northern Uganda, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said, calling for probe into the conduct of government forces.
The New-York based HRW accused the Ugandan Peoples' Defence Forces (UPDF) of indiscipline that has led to a raft of abuses while President Yoweri Museveni's government has stood by and failed to reign in on its errant soldiers.
"Soldiers in Uganda's national army have raped, beaten, arbitrarily detained and killed civilians in camps," said the report, entitled "Uprooted and Forgotten: Impunity and Human Rights Abuses in Northern Uganda."
"The Ugandan government has failed to pursue prosecution of military officers before national courts that could put an end to such violations," HRW researcher, Jemera Rone, told reporters.
"Instead of protecting its own citizens, it (the army) has permitted a widespread abuses against the civilian population which is only deepened the animosity between the people of northern Uganda and the central government in Kampala," she said.
"The discipline of the Ugandan soldiers is woefully lacking."
Ironically, Kampala has asked the International Criminal Court (ICC) to probe the insurgents for the violations, yet its troops are part of the problem, the report said.
"Justice in northern Uganda requires that the International Criminal Court thoroughly examine the government forces' crimes against civilian population as well as those committed against civilians," Rone said.
In addition, she said soldiers often administered beatings to civilians on flimsy ground, including arriving in the camps few minutes after curfews.
The report also blamed the army for failing to carrying out patrols and of sometimes fleeing the LRA insurgents when they carry out massive attacks in the region.
The LRA took over leadership of a rebellion in northern Uganda in 1988 and vowed to overthrow the government of President Yoweri Museveni and replace it with one based on the biblical Ten Commandments.
The group is, however, notorious for atrocities committed against civilians and abducting villagers as bearers, child soldier conscripts and sex slaves.
Kidnappings and slaughter of civilians has forced 1.6 million villages from settle into camps in northern Uganda, most of which are prone to attacks
"Children have been the primary victims of rebel abuses, although adults have not been spared," Rone added.
She said civilians do not have any recourse as the same soldiers they complain to are the ones who abuse them.
"No effective accountability structures exist in the camps," said Rone, adding that reports of abuses rarely result in probes or prosecutions of military personnel.
HRW said the 11th Batallion of UPDF, deployed in Cwero and Awach camps in Gulu district, "have committed numerous deliberate killings and constant beating of civilians" when it was deployed there early this year.
"Instead of holding the 11th Batallion's commanders accountable for the atrocities committed on their watch, the Ugandan army transferred the unit to another area of the country where its soldiers and officers can continue to commit abuse of different innocent people," Rone said.
But the east African state has enjoyed a positive image with the international community as a success story for its pursuit for democratic reforms.
Rone said this image stands in the way of efforts to pressure Kampala to clamp down on the LRA insurgents.
The government "seems to have convinced their donor partners that it should not be held accountable for this war going on for so long in northern Uganda," the researcher said.
However, Rone urged the Ugandan government and the ICC to hold the army accountable.
"It is a shame and really atrocious that the international community and even the people of Uganda haven't done and said more to try to bring all these abuses to an end," she added.
Copyright (c) 2005 Agence France-Presse
Received by NewsEdge Insight: 09/19/2005 16:03:56
LONDON BOMBS: FORMER UK CABINET MINISTER MEACHER SAYS MI6 IS TRYING TO COVER ITS TRACKS:
Michael Meacher was the UK's environment minister from 1997 to 2003.
In 2003, he wrote in the Guardian that the war on terrorism is bogus and that the 9/11 attacks gave the US an ideal pretext to use force to secure its global domination.
Now, in the 10 September 2005 Guardian, he is suggesting that the intelligence agencies may thwart the London bombings investigation.
Meacher looks at the links between the security services and certain 'Moslem' groups who may be linked to the London bombs.
The US used Pakistanis from Britain to fight in Bosnia, in order to weaken the Serb government's hold on Yugoslavia.
Meacher writes:
'According to a recent report by the Delhi-based Observer Research Foundation, a contingent was also sent by the Pakistani government, then led by Benazir Bhutto, at the request of the Clinton administration. This contingent was formed from the Harkat-ul- Ansar (HUA) terrorist group and trained by the ISI. The report estimates that about 200 Pakistani Muslims living in the UK went to Pakistan, trained in HUA camps and joined the HUA's contingent in Bosnia. Most significantly, this was "with the full knowledge and complicity of the British and American intelligence agencies".
'As the 2002 Dutch government report on Bosnia makes clear, the US provided a green light to groups on the state department list of terrorist organisations, including the Lebanese-based Hizbullah, to operate in Bosnia - an episode that calls into question the credibility of the subsequent "war on terror".
'For nearly a decade the US helped Islamist insurgents linked to Chechnya, Iran and Saudi Arabia destabilise the former Yugoslavia. The insurgents were also allowed to move further east to Kosovo. By the end of the fighting in Bosnia there were tens of thousands of Islamist insurgents in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo; many then moved west to Austria, Germany and Switzerland.
'Less well known is evidence of the British government's relationship with a wider Islamist terrorist network. During an interview on Fox TV this summer, the former US federal prosecutor John Loftus reported that British intelligence had used the al-Muhajiroun group in London to recruit Islamist militants with British passports for the war against the Serbs in Kosovo. Since July Scotland Yard has been interested in an alleged member of al-Muhajiroun, Haroon Rashid Aswat, who some sources have suggested could have been behind the London bombings.
'According to Loftus, Aswat was detained in Pakistan after leaving Britain, but was released after 24 hours. He was subsequently returned to Britain from Zambia, but has been detained solely for extradition to the US, not for questioning about the London bombings. Loftus claimed that Aswat is a British-backed double agent, pursued by the police but protected by MI6.
'One British Muslim of Pakistani origin radicalised by the civil war in Yugoslavia was LSE-educated Omar Saeed Sheikh. He is now in jail in Pakistan under sentence of death for the killing of the US journalist Daniel Pearl in 2002 - although many (including Pearl's widow and the US authorities) doubt that he committed the murder. However, reports from Pakistan suggest that Sheikh continues to be active from jail, keeping in touch with friends and followers in Britain.
Sheikh was recruited as a student by Jaish-e-Muhammad (Army of Muhammad), which operates a network in Britain. It has actively recruited Britons from universities and colleges since the early 1990s, and has boasted of its numerous British Muslim volunteers.
'Investigations in Pakistan have suggested that on his visits there Shehzad Tanweer, one of the London suicide bombers, contacted members of two outlawed local groups and trained at two camps in Karachi and near Lahore. Indeed the network of groups now being uncovered in Pakistan may point to senior al-Qaida operatives having played a part in selecting members of the bombers' cell. The Observer Research Foundation has argued that there are even "grounds to suspect that the [London] blasts were orchestrated by Omar Sheikh from his jail in Pakistan".
'Why then is Omar Sheikh not being dealt with when he is already under sentence of death? Astonishingly his appeal to a higher court against the sentence was adjourned in July for the 32nd time and has since been adjourned indefinitely. This is all the more remarkable when this is the same Omar Sheikh who, at the behest of General Mahmood Ahmed, head of the ISI, wired $100,000 to Mohammed Atta, the leading 9/11 hijacker, before the New York attacks, as confirmed by Dennis Lormel, director of FBI's financial crimes unit.
'Yet neither Ahmed nor Omar appears to have been sought for questioning by the US about 9/11. Indeed, the official 9/11 Commission Report of July 2004 sought to downplay the role of Pakistan with the comment: "To date, the US government has not been able to determine the origin of the money used for the 9/11 attacks. Ultimately the question is of little practical significance" - a statement of breathtaking disingenuousness.
'All this highlights the resistance to getting at the truth about the 9/11 attacks and to an effective crackdown on the forces fomenting terrorist bombings in the west, including Britain. The extraordinary US forbearance towards Omar Sheikh, its restraint towards the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb, Dr AQ Khan, selling nuclear secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea, the huge US military assistance to Pakistan and the US decision last year to designate Pakistan as a major non-Nato ally in south Asia all betoken a deeper strategic set of goals as the real priority in its relationship with Pakistan. These might be surmised as Pakistan providing sizeable military contingents for Iraq to replace US troops, or Pakistani troops replacing Nato forces in Afghanistan. Or it could involve the use of Pakistani military bases for US intervention in Iran, or strengthening Pakistan as a base in relation to India and China.
'Whether the hunt for those behind the London bombers can prevail against these powerful political forces remains to be seen. Indeed it may depend on whether Scotland Yard, in its attempts to uncover the truth, can prevail over MI6, which is trying to cover its tracks and in practice has every opportunity to operate beyond the law under the cover of national security.'
Michael Meacher is the Labour MP for Oldham West and Royton; he was environment minister from 1997 to 2003
THE PANORAMA OF THE TWO AMERICAS:
one Black, poor and fending for itself like after the abolition of the slave trade, another White, rich, affluent and in charge.
This panorama has been brought to you by Hurricane Katrina.
PRESIDENT ROBERT MEDARD MUGABE: "THE IMF IS GIVING NO REAL HELP TO DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
Mr Mugabe, making his ninth visit to Cuba, said the IMF is "almost never a real assistance to developing countries".
The organisation is "willed by the big powers which dictate what it should do", Zimbabwe's president claimed.
"We have never been friends with the IMF and in the future we will never be friends of the IMF," he added.
***BBC, 8.09.2005: ZIMBABWE ACCUSES CIA OF FILM PLOT
Zimbabwe has accused a recent Hollywood film starring Nicole Kidman of being a "CIA-sponsored" campaign against President Robert Mugabe.
Acting Information Minister Chen Chimutengwende said The Interpreter was a thinly-disguised swipe at Mr Mugabe.
Kidman plays an interpreter at the UN who overhears a plot to kill the leader of a fictional African country.
Mr Chimutengwende called it propaganda and showed that "Zimbabwe's enemies did not rest".
Enemy
Directed by Sydney Pollack, the film also stars Sean Penn as a secret agent who investigates the assassination plot.
Mr Chimutengwende said the film, which centres on an octogenarian African leader who plans to address the UN General Assembly, had "obvious connections" to Mr Mugabe.
"The film talks about an African president going to the United Nations and our president is going to the UN next week so the connection is so obvious," he said.
Robert Mugabe came to power in 1980
"It is part of a CIA-sponsored fight... but we will defeat them and we will defeat neo-colonialism. We have defeated a powerful enemy before which was colonialism," Mr Chimutengwende added.
Mr Mugabe has been in power since 1980 when Zimbabwe won independence from the UK.
He is accused by foreign critics and domestic opposition of being responsible for the country's economic decline and for stifling democracy.
Sanctions were imposed on the country by the European Union and the US following the last presidential election.
The election was condemned as seriously flawed by the opposition and foreign observers.
The Interpreter ran for two weeks in July at cinemas in the Zimbabwean capital Harare and is now available on video.
Opposition legislator Trudy Stevenson described the accusations as "paranoia" that came two months too late.
***HELLO SIR BOB GELDORF! Even after Live8, Zambia is asked to pay loans despite debt relief....
According to Panapress (25.08.2005), Zambia's Finance and Economic Development Minister Ng'andu Magande says western lenders want Zambia to continue repaying its foreign debt for the time being. This will dash the nation's hopes that debt relief would bring immediate savings for poverty reduction.
The request by the International Monetary Fund, the IMF, World Bank and G8 rich nations follows their decision earlier this year to forgive part of Zambia's external debt, estimated at seven-point-one billion dollars in May.
Magande says the IMF, the World Bank and G8 had asked Zambia to continue servicing its foreign debt despite a three-point-95 billion dollar debt relief package approved for the country by the Fund in May. Zambia would as a result save only 38 million dollars in 2005, which would be used to clear arrears owed to road contractors, Magande said.
***Rwandans Hutu and Tutsi who came to the Democratic Republic of Congo as refugees in the 1970s and now claim to be Congolese are working for the demise of the Democratci Republic of Congo.
As a concrete example, Rwanda backed an in insuregency against Congo in June 2004. The two terrorists claiming to be Congolese and officers of the Congolese armed forces who should be tried, Laurent Nkundabatware et Jules Mutebusi, both Rwandans living in Congo led the insurgency. Now Paul Kagame has given them political asylum in Rwanda. This proves that not only are they not Congolese but terrorists sheltered by a rogue state that Rwanda is. The same Rwanda which invaded and occupied eastern Congo for six years under the pretext of pursuing the terrorists Interahamwe who committed the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
Rwandan troops still make regular incursions into the Congolese territory on the basis of the same claim and pretext, looting Congo's natural and mineral resources, raping, killing Congolese natives and applying a scorched earth policy in eastern Congo under the watch of the international community, especially the USA. The tide will be overturened soon, because justice is on the side of Congolese.
Latest News: Azarias Ruberwa, a Rwandan who came to Congo as a refugee in 1976 but now he is one of the vice-presidents in the transitional government in Kinshasa by the will of Britain and America, was nearly lynched in Bukavu and Uvira by autochton Congolese.
They have had enough with rapes, looting and massacres! A a heavy deployment of UN troops follow Ruberwa everywhere. Is it the Un that is going to elect Rwandans into power in congo?
***THE CITY OF GOMA, EASTERN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO COULD SOON BE WIPED OUT!
AFP - The Nyiragongo volcano that looms over Goma in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo could soon wipe out the city, said a risk analysis report by volcano experts leaked to AFP.
Provincial authorities in Nord-Kivu have prohibited public release of the report that recommends the city be moved to avoid the fallout of another volcanic eruption, possibly within two years.
"The risk of a new eruption of Nyiragongo is clear, with a 13 percent chance that the city would survive," the report states.
In January 2002, 400,000 people were evacuated when a lava flow from the volcano destroyed almost 80 percent of the buildings in the city near the Rwandan border. More than 40 people were reportedly killed and the airport was demolished.
"It is absurd and surprising to suppress such information that, given in time, can help the population take useful steps," a specialist said.
The 3,465-metre (11,365 foot) volcano has a two-kilometre wide crater with an active lava lake in the centre. With nearby Nyamuragira, it is responsible for about 40 percent of all volcanic activity in the continent.
Nyiragongo's lava flows are extremely fluid, travelling at speeds up to 100 kilometres (60 miles) an hour. An eruption in 1977 reportedly killed more than 70 people.
***REMEMBRANCE DAYS OF THE GENOCIDES OF THE CONGOLESE
Dear, friends, sisters, and brothers,
The Congolese communities of Canada and organisations sympathising with the DR Congo invite you to participate to the Congolese Genocides Commemorative Days.
This event takes places for one week, around August 17 every year to remember 15 women buried alive in Kivu, and also to remind the genocides in Congo, of which one is still going on and has made 4 millions victims to date (Radio Canada /CBC, August 7, 2005).
On August 23, from 5:00 P.M., in Ottawa, our activities: a projection of the Canadian documentary (NFB), Le Prix de la Paix / The Peacekeepers by Paul Cowan on the massacres of Bunia (DR Congo) and the UN commitment, testimonies and a conference, held at the Canada National Library. Among lecturers are names such as P. Kanamby, Congolese politics expert, P. Cowan, Canadian filmmaker (NBF), J. Philpot, former attorney at the International Court for Rwanda, and K. Chira, Congolese historian. This family activity is free, open to everyone and ends by a snack.
Event: Commemoration of the Congolese Genocides
Date and time: August 23, 2005, at 5:00 P.M.
Venue: Library & Archives of Canada (Near Supreme Court, Parliament), 395 Wellington Street, Ottawa, Canada
Inquiries: Constant Mudek. Koko, Tel.: (613) 263-2376; aafca@yahoo.ca
Involved Organisations:
Congolese Community of Ottawa-Gatineau
Kivu Conference of North America
Assembly of Afro-Canadians Assembly (AAfCa)
Kibuti Association
Kikanda Mutuality
Baraza La Kivu
Maison Culturelle Kasai
Kivu International la Voix de l’Unite (K.I.V.U.)
*See: Kofi Annan Wants You To See This Film; Peter Schneider;EMBASSY, Ottawa, May 11th, 2005
***ALERTE! 80,000 Rwandans, Ugandans, Burundians re-invade eastern Congo under the pretext of beign Congolese refugees returning home to en rol and vote during the elections!
Consequence: violance has again increased and flurred up in eastern Congo with many reports of rapes, killings, massacres and armed robberies being the daily lot of Congolese autochtons.
***THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF cONGO IS VERY RICH IN TIMBERS (GIGANTESQUE FORESTS), AND EXPORTS PLENTY APART FROM WHAT IS LOOTED BY RWANDA AND UGANDA, YET CONGOLESE NOW BURY THEIR LOVED ONES WITHOUT COFFINS.
Here, a child is being burried in Bunia without a coffin!(Photo: AFP/File). More than five million people have been killed by Tutsi invading troops from Rwanda and Uganda.
Yet, on 13.08.2005, Tutsi living in Congo commemorated the massacres committed by Tutsi themselves in a refugee camp, in Katumba, near the Burundi border with Congo (put Gatumba in our search engine and you will know what we are talking about).
The strategy of the Tutsi in Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi and in the Democratic Republic of Congo to strike, kill, massacre, rape and loot first, and then play the violin to an "international community" which has virtually become either their most trusted ally or which has been hold to ransom and taken for a ride for a very long time now! It is stargegy aimed atconquering eastern Congo and annexing it to Rwanda.
In fact, North Kivu province (Chief city: Goma) is totally in the hands of the Tutsi. That is good for American interests in that region.
***WE SHOULD LEARN FROM MUGABE, SAYS SOUTH AFRICA'S DEPUTY LEADER
12 August 2005
South Africa’s new Deputy President, Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, has called for her country to copy Zimbabwe’s land reform policies in an attempt to speed up redistribution.
Mrs Mlambo-Ngcuka’s remarks came shortly after a government summit to review South Africa's land reforms opted to drop the willing buyer/willing seller policy in favour of a new policy yet to be spelt out.
“Land reform in South Africa has been too slow and too structured. There needs to be a bit of ‘oomph? That’s why we may need the skills of Zimbabwe to help us,?she said at an education conference.
“On agrarian and land reform, South Africa should learn some lessons from Zimbabwe - how to do it fast.?
***ROBERT MEDARD MUGABE CONFOUNDS THEM!
Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe (3rd R) decorating senior officers who fought in the Democratic Republic of Congo at the 25th anniversary of the Armed Forces day at Rufaro Stadium in the capital Harare August 9, 2005. Mugabe praised the armed forces for their loyalty and courage since Zimbabwe won it's independence from Britain in 1980 (photo by REUTERS/Howard Burditt).
Whether you like him or loathe him, you have to agree with President Mugabe on this:
"Let those long distance philanthropists who want to romanticise shacks ... tell us why they don't allow them in their own land," said Mugabe.
***PAINFUL ANNIVERSARY!
SIXTY YEARS AFTER THE ATOMIC BOMB MADE OUT OF URANIUM EXTRACTED FROM THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO WAS DROPPED BY THE US ON THE JAPANESE CITIES OF HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI, WE ASK THIS FUNDAMENTAL QUESTION:
ARE CONGO'S RADIO-ACTIVE MINERALS SAFE IN THE HANDS OF AMERICANS? NAPALM WAS USED IN EASTERN CONGO BY RWANDA (backed by Britain and America) TO CLEAR EASTERN CONGO OF ITS NATIVE POPULATION AND ANNEX IT TO RWANDA.
***CONGOLESE PEOPLE PAY TRIBUTE TO ROBIN COOK. WHY?
The former Foreign Secretary Robin Cook who died on 6.08.2005, aged 59, was the only high ranking British official who acknowledged in an interview with Antoine Roger Lokongo, a London-based Congolese journalist that "Rwanda bore a great responsibility inn the invasion, looting and the killing of more than 5 million people in the Democratic Republic of Congo".
SPECIAL REPORT
***RWANDA AND UGANDA ACCUSED OF CONTINUING EXPLOITATION OF NATURAL RESOURCES OF THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO
“While the armed groups of the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo continue reaping terror, the financial dimension of the pillaging of natural resources, particularly in favour of Uganda and Rwanda, remains the key to their presence and justifies the decision adopted by the Security Council to extend the arms embargo?
This is the ‘picture?of the situation in the eastern provinces of the Democratic Republic of Congo given by Mamadouh Bah, spokesman for the MONUC (United Nations Mission in DR Congo), presenting a report of UN experts in the capital Kinshasa. The report establishes ?or better, confirms ?a direct link between the illegal exploitation of natural resources of East DR-Congo and the arms trafficking in the zone, benefited by the numerous rebel groups still active in Ituri, in North and South Kivu.
In their report, the experts reveal a series of incongruences between the effective mineral resources of Uganda and Rwanda and the relative exportations: in 2004, for example, Congo exported 647,85kg of gold, for a value of around $7,5-million.
“Based on an inquiry conducted in Uganda, the quantity of gold from neighbouring ex-Zaire and then exported from Uganda on the international markets is of 6 tonnes, equivalent to over $60-million? explained Bah, adding that according to the government of Kampala this production is local, but is “entirely contradicted?by the statistics from the world gold market.
Another example: last year the Democratic Republic of Congo exported 6-thousand tonnes of cassiterite (from which tin is extracted), for a value of $5-million, while Rwanda ?which does not result to have large quantities of this mineral ?provided figures indicating that it exported around 3,500 tonnes of it, with a profit of over $15-million. The UN experts call for “close co-operation between the Great Lakes Nations?to put an end to the exploitation of the resources and “halt the violations of the arms embargo?imposed by the UN only in 2003, at the end of a war that starting in 1998 resulted ?also from famine and disease ?in no less than 5 million victims.
The Security Council also extended the mandate of the experts by another 6 months, calling on them to continue providing information “on the source of illegal financing of arms, in particular that from the illegal exploitation of resources?of Congo.
OTHER SPECIAL REPORTS
***Taking advantage of or knowing that the whole attention of the international community is now foucused on the London bombing, Rwanda and Uganda relaunch war against the Democratic Republic of Congo by proxi to scapper the electoral process in eastern Congo which they still consider as an economic and demographic hinterland. Rwanda has already redeployed 2160 soldiers who have infiltrated Nord-Kivu and South Kivu.
***Witness recounts horror of massacre in the DRC
Jean-Baptiste Baderha, Mail and Guardian, Bukavu, Democratic Republic of Congo
13 July 2005
A witness on Tuesday gave a gruesome account of how a massacre in the Democratic Republic of Congo took place last weekend, accusing the perpetrators of locking up innocent people and then burning them.
"The criminals locked up people in their homes and then burned everything," a survivor of the killings at Ntulumamba, a village in the east of DRC, said after members of an armed group killed more than 30 civilians there on Saturday night.
The headmaster of Ntulumamba's primary school, who only gave his name as Bisimwa, managed to flee when the disaster unfolded and walked 70km to Sud-Kivu province's main town Bukavu to find help.
A man in his forties, Bisimwa identified the armed men as "rasta", a local militia, and Rwandan Hutu FDLR rebels who have been roving eastern DRC for the past 11 years.
The Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) has denied any involvement in the attack.
"It started around 9pm (7pm GMT)," said Bisimwa. "A group led by Mr Kyombe Cinja-Cinja surprised people in their homes, at Kabingu in the village of Ntulumamba."
He identified Cinja-Cinja as a Rwandan, and said he came to the area with his men to punish the local population for allegedly cooperating with the United Nations and the regular Congolese army which have been trying to restore security in Sud-Kivu since July 4.
Bisimwa fled along with other residents, mainly men, hiding in a nearby forest at night. He only returned to the village on Sunday morning.
"Before we went to Bukavu, we counted 35 dead and seven wounded including six women and one child," he said as four survivors looked on in silence.
None of them said whether they had lost any relatives in the massacre.
Bisimwa said the fire lasted about an hour and that the assailants left quickly after the killings.
"Many people fled to Kalehe," about 20km north of Ntulumamba," he said, sure that some of them must have been wounded.
"We have asked the Congolese armed forces to make the area safe," he said insisting that he would return to his village once it was secure.
The UN mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (Monuc) on Tuesday dispatched an inquiry team to the eastern Sud-Kivu region to investigate the weekend violence. Monuc announced on Monday that "more than 30 civilians, mostly women" had been herded into their huts which were then set alight in the attack.
The province bordering Rwanda and Burundi remains one of the most volatile regions in DRC, still struggling to emerge from a 1998-2003 war and home to many former rebel and militia groups.
The UN forces, part of a mission of more than 17 000 troops, police and civilians, are spread across the country with a dual role of helping promote progress towards democratic elections and keeping the peace.
Rwandan Hutu rebels, allied with the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, have spent more than a decade in eastern DRC, fleeing accusations that they were actively involved in the 1994 Rwandan genocide which left 800 000 people, essentially minority Tutsis, dead, according to a UN toll.
Source: Sapa-AFP
***At least 30 people, largely women, were killed and 50 others wounded after an attack by armed men that set huts on fire in a village located in the region of South Kivu said Kemal Saiki, information officer from the UN mission in Congo, MONUC.
The episode took place during the night between Saturday and Sunday in the area of Ntutumamba, about 70 km. north of the provincial capital of Bukavu.
“According to the earliest information received by the peacekeepers from Pakistan, it seems as if all 36 huts of the village were set afire. ?
”It is difficult to provide an official toll for the victims, but at least 27 to 28 women died along with some children?said?Saiki.
Witnesses told soldiers that the massacre was led by Rwandan rebel Hutus belonging to the same Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDIR), accused of involvement in the genocide of 1994, and who have been living in the eastern Congo since over10 years ago.
However, FDIR has denied its responsibility accusing local armed groups instead.
Sources in Bukavu noted that there were flows of migrants fleeing the violence especially in the areas of Walungu and Nindja, where there have been frequent attacks lately.
“The people are seeking refuge in the city because of the indiscriminate violence of the northern area not more than 10km from Bukavu? Last week the army launched a clean-up operation called, Falcon Sweep, using at least 3,000 soldiers.
Two Mass Graves Reported in Eastern Congolese Village of Ntulumamba
UN Integrated Regional Information Networks
Bunia, 13 July 13, 2005.
Two mass graves believed to contain the remains of 39 civilians killed on Saturday in Ntulumamba village, in Kalonge Chiefdom 75 km north of Bukavu, have been reported to the UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC), a UN spokeswoman said.
The spokeswomen, Sylvie van den Wildenberg, said on Wednesday from Bukavu that survivors revealed the graves and said they mostly contained the bodies of women and children. MONUC's Pakistani South Kivu Brigade dispatched an airborne Quick Reaction Force to investigate, along with UN civilian teams.
"This mission has the task of establishing those responsible for the massacre so that they will be hunted down," she said.
A follow-up team comprising MONUC human rights, child protection and humanitarian staff, as well as forensic specialists and representatives of Congo's judicial authorities will be sent to the village.
Survivors had told MONUC they were attacked by Rwandan Hutu rebels of the Forces democratique de liberation du Rwanda (FDLR); a view shared by the acting governor of South Kivu Province, Didas Kaningini. The survivors said the rebels struck at night. They said the rebels herded villagers into their huts, locked them up and set the huts alight. Those who resisted being placed in the huts were slashed with cutlasses.
"They demanded dollars, and since we did not have any they tied us up, sprinkled us with gasoline and set us alight," a survivor said over UN-supported Radio Okapi.
A senior officer of the FDLR, Edmong Ngarambe, denied his group was responsible. He blamed the Rastas, a breakaway dissident FDLR group which, he said, worked closely with Congolese militias. Another survivor, speaking over Congolese Radio in Bukavu, supported Ngarambe's claim.
"It was Col Kiyombe Chinja Chinja's Rastas who maltreated us. They accused us of giving away their positions to the Congolese army and MONUC," the survivor, whose name was withheld, said.
The FDLR and Rastas have previously been accused of mass killings and human rights violations in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Many of their leaders are accused of having masterminded or carried out the 1994 genocide in Rwanda in which some 937,000 Tutsis and politically moderate Hutus were killed in 100 days.
As they continue to kill, President Joseph Kabila has ordered his army to disarm all other foreign armed groups in eastern Congo. The FDLR is the largest of these groups. Others are Burundi's Front national de liberation (FNL) headed by Agathon Rwasa, in the region of Uvira; the Allied Democratic Forces/National Army for the Liberation of Uganda (ADF/NALU) in the Beni/Butembo region; and the People's Redemption Army whose precise locations have not yet been verified.
The FDLR occupies an area on the east side of the Kahuzi-Biega National Park, where there are no Congolese troops.
"We do not know what goes on over there, but we have a battalion ready and are awaiting orders to move in to protect civilians," Lt Kasanda Wa Kasanda, the Congolese army spokesman in Bukavu, told IRIN.
[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations ]
***Rwanda versus Congo at the International Criminal Court
Rwanda is accused of smuggling weapons into eastern DR Congo. The International Court of Justice in The Hague has begun hearing allegations of human rights atrocities committed by Rwandan troops in DR Congo.
DR Congo accuses its neighbour of armed aggression, mass slaughter, rape, abduction, looting and assassination. It wants the tribunal, also called the World Court, to order Rwandan forces to leave the country and pay reparations.
***Uganda ready to attack Congo by proxi from Ituri using Congolese militia it created: Col. Bwambale Kakolele, former military commander of RCD-ML army; Col. Mathieu NGonjolo, leader of the FNI (Front for National Integration), a group made up of Lendu tribesmen only; Dieudionne Mbuna, former minister of the UPC rebel group, Gido Panyiroha, a rebel of the PUSIC - a rebel group made up of Hema tribesmen only and another FNI rebel simply known as Mr Sambi.
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL - UK gunrunners fuelling killings, mass rape and torture in Democratic Republic of Congo
Large quantities of weapons and ammunition from the Balkans and eastern Europe have been flown by UK-based firms into Africa’s conflict-ridden Great Lakes region, despite evidence of their use in gross human rights violations, according to new research issued on 5 July 2005.
According to documents and witness statements obtained by Amnesty International, six flights of arms from Albanian company MEICO, took place from Tirana to Kigali in planeloads each carrying over 40 metric tones of arms and ammunition in October/November 2002.
This included several million rounds of Kalashnikov ammunition. At least one shipment contained grenades and rocket launchers.
Amnesty International has found that three of the companies involved in these arms deliveries operated from the UK:
African International Airways (Crawley, West Sussex), Intavia Ltd (Crawley and Gatwick), and Platinum Air Cargo (Egham, Surrey)
The shipments from south east Europe have continued to Rwanda using other cargo companies despite a peace process initiated in 2002, a United Nations arms embargo and Rwandan backing of DRC rebels.
At the same time, further arms supplies flowed into the eastern DRC from agents close to the Kinshasa and Uganda governments.
Amnesty International’s report, Democratic Republic of Congo: Arming the east, reveals the role played by arms dealers, brokers and transporters from countries including Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Czech Republic, Israel, Russia, Serbia, South Africa, the UK and USA.
It traces the supply of weapons and ammunition to the governments of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Uganda and their subsequent distribution to armed groups and militia in the eastern DRC that have been involved in atrocities amounting to war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Amnesty International UK Media Director Mike Blakemore said:
"Millions have already lost their lives during seven years of conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Armed men are still raping, looting and killing civilians ?as arms deliveries continue.
"If the international community, the UN and individual countries involved fail to halt this proliferation, the fragile peace process will collapse with disastrous consequences."
"Evidence that UK-based firms have profited from these deals is sickening. The UK government should ensure that a full, independent and public investigation takes place, with all documentation made public."
The new report documents evidence that during the entire peace process in the DRC, military aid has been provided from agents close to the Rwanda, Uganda and the DRC governments to armed groups and militia in eastern DRC.
The report also provides evidence of the continuing role of Russian arms trafficker Victor Bout and his close associates, using local operators, who have secretly armed all sides in the DRC conflict.
Amnesty International is calling on the United Nations Security Council to renew and strengthen the UN embargo on arms exports to the DRC and impose severe restrictions or embargoes on any state found to be exporting arms to armed groups or militia in the DRC.
The Council must ensure that all airports in the eastern DRC are monitored by specialised UN inspectors 24 hours a day, and that all aircraft found carrying illegal arms cargoes are grounded.
The organisation is also calling on all states to ensure that violations of the UN arms embargoes are made a serious criminal offence and to investigate all credible reports of illegal arms transfers.
Supplier states named in the report should investigate whether any laws have been broken and if their arms export systems are sufficiently strict and consistent with international law.
Amnesty International is calling for an Arms Trade Treaty to strictly control the transfer of all conventional arms and prevent them being used for grave human rights abuses.
Other military aid and arms transfers documented in the report include:
Rwanda
Up to 400 tonnes of mostly surplus Kalashnikov ammunition shipped from Albania and Serbia to Rwanda with the involvement of Israeli, Rwandan, South African and UK companies between the end of 2002 and mid 2003, followed by more flights from eastern Europe in mid-2004;
A further order for 130 tonnes of surplus arms and ammunition from Bosnia approved by the US government in November 2004 against the backdrop of new US military aid agreements for Rwanda;
Ongoing military support by Rwanda to armed groups in the DRC, particularly the RCD-Goma, linked to exploitation of the country’s natural resources.
DRC
The existence of arms-for-diamonds agreements involving the DRC government and companies in the Czech Republic, Israel and the Ukraine; Evidence in 2004 of an arms trafficking network linking the DRC and Liberia involving international cargo companies; The transfer of over 200 tons of arms to a pro-government armed group in north Kivu by a local company using aircraft from a South African firm supplying UN peacekeepers in 2003.
Uganda
The Ugandan government’s failure to report to the UN imports of weapons and ammunition from Croatia and Slovakia worth over US$ 1million in 2002;
Donations of military vehicles from China in 2002 and attempts by the Ugandan government to import more arms from Israel in 2003;
Evidence that the Ugandan military authorities repeatedly supplied arms, ammunition and military support to armed opposition groups in the eastern DRC in 2003 and 2004, especially to groups controlling DRC gold mining areas and trade routes.
Mike Blakemore said:
"International arms flows into the region have been channelled by powerful agents close to the governments of the DRC, Rwanda, and Uganda to various armed groups and militia in eastern DRC who practise banditry and show little or no respect for human rights."
U.N. official: Uganda shelters Democratic Republic of Congo's rebels
Thursday, July 21, 2005
KINSHASA, Congo (Reuters) -- A U.N. official in Congo accused neighboring Uganda on Thursday of violating the "letter and spirit" of a U.N. Security Council resolution by sheltering Congolese rebels wanted for crimes against humanity.
Uganda denied reports the Congolese guerrillas were using its territory to launch a new rebel movement aimed at seizing power and insisted the gunmen only wanted Kampala's help to join Congo's transitional government.
But a document obtained by the United Nations and seen by Reuters announces the formation of a new rebel "political military" force, which is known as the Congolese Revolutionary Movement and combines fighters from Congo's North Kivu province and lawless Ituri district.
"We are being told [by Ugandan authorities] that these people are coming on personal business, but the fact remains that to accept their presence on the territory and not hand them over to justice is contrary to the letter and spirit of the U.N. resolutions," said U.N. spokesman Kemal Saiki in Kinshasa.
Under Security Council resolutions passed during the last two years, Uganda is obliged to stop its territory being used by groups fighting in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, prevent Uganda from being used as a route for trafficking arms into the country and hand over its suspected war criminals.
"They [the rebels] are known armed groups that have a proven track record of murder, pillage and the killing of U.N. peacekeepers, which is a crime against humanity," Saiki said.
The declaration bore a legend saying it was signed in Kampala on June 15 and the signatures of 15 rebel commanders, including members of Ituri's Hema and Lendu ethnic militias.
In it, the Congolese Revolutionary Movement says it has 20,000 trained soldiers and draws its men from several armed groups in mineral-rich eastern Congo.
THE MONITOR: Uganda risks UN ban over Congo
FRANK NYAKAIRU & AGENCIES
The Monitor, KAMPALA
Uganda risks sanctions for harbouring a new Congolese rebel group.
The United Nations mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo, (Monuc) says it is concerned by the creation of a new rebel group in Uganda. Uganda may be violating its international obligations by allowing its territory to be used by armed groups from eastern DR Congo, Monuc adds.
According to the BBC yesterday, which cited a Monuc document, Uganda is harbouring a new rebel group of the Congolese Revolutionary Movement (MRC), which says it is fighting for the rights of the people in DR Congo’s eastern Ituri and North Kivu regions.
Colonel Bwambale Kakolele, a former army commander of Mbusa Nyamwisi’s defunct rebel group is heading it. Nyamwsi, a former rebel based in Beni, northeastern Congo is now a junior minister in the Kinshasa foreign affairs ministry.
The Uganda defense and army spokesman Lt. Col Shaban Bantariza confirmed Congolese rebels had been in Uganda but denied that they were here on anti-Kinshasa mission.
“Yes these people were here to persuade us to talk to Kinshasa to integrate them because only 18 per cent of the force was reintegrated leaving them disgruntled,?Bantariza said yesterday.
“We do not have any rebel group against Kinshasa here and we shall not allow them to do anything from here. We will arrest them and hand them over to Kinshasa,?he added. The group is made up of elements of various groups operating in the east.
The document announcing the formation of the MRC, which describes itself as a political and military movement, was signed by 15 men - all of whom are now wanted by the chief prosecutor in the Congolese town of Bunia.
Last month President Yoweri Museveni wrote to his Congolese counterpart Joseph Kabila complaining about the lack of disarmament of militia fighters in the east.
He warned that Uganda would “react vigorously?if attacked.
Despite the official statements of denial by the government, Uganda is likely to once again come under suspicion of working with Congolese rebels.
The UN mission in DR Congo points to a UN Security Council resolution passed in March this year that calls on Uganda not to allow its territory to be used by armed groups from the region.
It also points out that under another Security Council resolution Uganda is obliged to hand over to face justice anyone suspected to have carried out human rights atrocities. In Kampala, I met Justin Lobho, one of the signatories to the MRC document, who used to be in the FNI rebel group in Ituri and disarmed in March.
He says whether you disarm or not you are harassed. He accused people in the Kinshasa government of being responsible for some of the bloodshed in Ituri. This new group, he said, would make sure it was listened to and denied that it had received support from Uganda.
The same group of Congolese rebels is known to have recently been to the Rwandan capital, Kigali. Whatever the possible threat posed by the formation of the MRC, the presence in eastern DR Congo of yet another rebel group is unlikely to be welcomed by a population tired of war.
***Protests over the delay of the national election in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
Police have confirmed they used live ammunition to break up protests in some parts of Kinshasa, as well as tear gas and plastic bullets.
The protesters were calling for an end to a post civil war transition period that was supposed to finish with elections this week.
However the transitional government under President Joseph Kabila has delayed the poll until next March and the electoral commission is expected to further extend the deadline until next June.
The elections have been delayed due to logistical problems with voter registration and continued violence in the country's east.
These are the remnants of Mobutu's era and Etienne Tsisekedi’s followers, who cliam ten of theirs were killed, lying and spitting on the 5 millions Congolese who have been massacred by troops from Rwandan and Uganda since 2 august 1998.
Tshisekedi was involved in Patrice Lumumba's death, a friend of Mobutu and of Museveni and Kagame.
They are demonstrating about the delay of the organisation of elections, well knowing that we had two wars waged by the Tutsi within a year, notwithstanding the fact that they had already invaded Congo since 1998, killing 5 millions of Patrice Lumumba’s compatriots.
They know it, and so they think they can fool everybody.
*** Through forcing and intimidation, Museveni gets a third term as president of Uganda. The entourage, made up mostly of generals who have looted in Congo feel vulnerable if he goes now because the international criminal court is on their heels for crimes against humanity they have committed in Congo. They think Museveni will look after their backs vice-versa. Museveni can be at the helm in Uganda for a 100 years, but justice will still catch up with him and his entourage!
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