Congo Watch

DR Congo/Rwanda: FDLR in nuclear materials deals - FDLR rebels keeping unsold Uranium –says UN

2010-12-03T15:05:00.007Z

ACCORDING to the below copied reports, a United Nations Investigative Report in the DR of Congo has unearthed information that the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) rebels possess large portions of deadly Uranium, which they have since failed to sell.

The report, released by UN investigators, this week, indicates that the FDLR rebels, mainly Ex-FAR genocidal forces, are stuck with hundreds of kilograms of Uranium, a mineral used to make nuclear weapons.

UN experts revealed that the FDLR rebels discovered a deposit of precious minerals, which included six 70-kg canisters of uranium in Walikale territory of eastern DRC, after a tip-off by local chiefs.

Full story below.

Rwanda: FDLR in Nuclear Material Deals
Source: The New Times - www.newtimes.co.rw
Author: Edmund Kagire
Date: Thursday, 02 December 2010
Reprinted at allafrica.com

(Kigali) — A United Nations Investigative Report in the DRC has unearthed information that the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) rebels possess large portions of the deadly Uranium, which they have since failed to sell.

The report, released by UN investigators, this week, indicates that the FDLR rebels, mainly Ex-FAR genocidal forces, are stuck with hundreds of kilograms of Uranium, a mineral used to make nuclear weapons, which they have failed to sell for the last 2 years.

According to the report, the rebels have been trying to sell the deadly mineral on the black market.

UN experts revealed that the FDLR rebels discovered a deposit of precious minerals, which included six 70-kg canisters of uranium in Walikale territory of eastern DRC, after a tip-off by local chiefs.

The minerals were found in 2008 in a hidden underground vault.

The UN investigators say Sylvestre Mudacumura, the FDLR High Commander General tried to sell the Uranium through "his long-time business associate, Evariste Shamamba, of Établissement Namukaya".

"Établissement Namukaya subsequently held the canister for over a year without finding a buyer, and it was eventually returned to a pastor living in Kalehe," reads the report released Monday to the UN Security Council.

The investigators describe the material as "un-enriched uranium" - meaning it cannot be used to make nuclear bombs in its current form. The amount would not be enough to create even a small amount of fissile material, said the UN team.

Since the FDLR - through their contacts could not find a buyer for more than a year, they gave up, suggesting they are still in possession of some of the mineral.

The report also noted that joint Rwanda-DR Congo military operations have pushed the rebels out of the known mines, but the rebels have moved into mines in far rural areas.

The UN experts said they had given Interpol details of the attempted trade as well as the International Atomic Energy Agency, which has been monitoring illicit traffic from DRCs Katanga Province, where there are Uranium deposits.

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FDLR rebels keeping unsold Uranium –says UN
Source: Rwanda News Agency (RNA) - rnanews.com
Author: RNA Reporters
Date: Tuesday, 30 November 2010; 11:19. Copy in full:

Text message from Établissement Namukaya agent wishing to sell alleged uranium on behalf of the FDLR rebels. This same company also sells minerals for Congolese soldiers - using Kigali, Bujumbura and Kampala as the transit routes (Courtesy photo)

Kigali: Rwandan FDLR rebels are keeping hundreds of kilograms of Uranium – a mineral used to make atomic weapons, for which they have failed to get a buyer for two years now, according to UN investigators.

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Wikileaks desnuda la política exterior de EEUU: revelan esfuerzos ...

‎
El Diario CoLatino - 2 days ago

Se trata de un material que aporta novedades relevantes sobre el manejo de asuntos de gran repercusión mundial, como el programa nuclear de Irán, ...

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Click on FDLR label here below to view previous reports.

UN sanctions 4 FDLR leaders in DR Congo - Congo Siasa blog is back - New UN Group of Experts Report is out

2010-12-02T01:05:00.024Z

Press Release from the Permanent Missions to the UN of France, the UK, and the US on the Designation for Sanctions of Four Additional Individuals in the DRC
Source: United States Mission to the United Nations - usun.state.gov
New York, NY
Wednesday, 01 December 2010

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The Permanent Missions to the United Nations of France, the United Kingdom, and the United States submitted to the Security Council’s Committee established pursuant to Resolution 1533 (2004) concerning the Democratic Republic of the Congo, three FDLR leaders and one individual responsible for targeting children in situations of armed conflict, to be added to the list of individuals and entities subject to a worldwide travel ban and asset freeze.

These four individuals are: Gaston IYAMUREMYE, Félicien NSANZUBUKIRE, Innocent ZIMURINDA and Leodomir MUGARAGU.
Members of the Committee agreed on 1 December 2010 that these four individuals be placed on the Committee’s list of designees for DRC sanctions.

These designations demonstrate the international community’s continued determination to fight against those who oppose the disarmament of rebel groups in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and those responsible for the recruitment of children and serious human rights abuses.

The UN sanctions regime for DRC was renewed for a further 12 months on 29 November 2010 through the adoption of UNSCR 1952. As part of their work the Group of Experts have developed a clear set of due diligence guidelines for the minerals supply chain in eastern DRC. These guidelines, which the Security Council supported taking forward in SCR 1952, will help avoid financing further conflict in eastern DRC.

The Permanent Missions to the United Nations of France, the United Kingdom, and the United States will continue to work with members of the Democratic Republic of the Congo Sanctions Committee to identify the individuals and entities that meet the criteria in Resolution 1857 (2008).

Background
The UN Security Council Committee established pursuant to resolution 1533 (2004) concerning the Democratic Republic of the Congo is responsible for monitoring UN Member State implementation of the sanctions in place in the DRC. The Committee comprises all 15 members of the Security Council, and was authorized by Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1596 (2005) to list individuals and entities for an assets freeze and travel ban. The Committee decided on 1 December 2010 to list the four individuals named below, whose actions have undermined stability in the DRC. Their designation follows a request to the Committee from the Governments of France, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Those now under UNSC sanctions as a result of the Committee’s action today include:

1. Gaston IYAMUREMYE, born in 1948 in Musanze District (Northern Province), Rwanda. According to multiple sources, including the UNSC DRC Sanctions Committee’s Group of Experts, Gaston Iyamuremye is considered a core member of the FDLR military and political leadership and has become the group’s president. Gaston Iyamuremye also ran Ignace Murwanashyaka’s (previous President of the FDLR) office in Kibua, DRC until December 2009.

2. Félicien NSANZUBUKIRE, born in 1967 in Murama, Kinyinya, Rubungo, Kigali, Rwanda. Félicien Nsanzubukire has been a member of the FDLR since at least 1994 and operating in eastern DRC since October 1998. The UNSC DRC Sanction Committee’s Group of Experts reports that Félicien Nsanzubukire supervised and coordinated the trafficking of ammunition and weapons between at least November 2008 and April 2009 from the United Republic of Tanzania, via Lake Tanganyika, to FDLR units based in the Uvira and Fizi areas of South Kivu.

3. Innocent ZIMURINDA, born in 1975 or on September 1, 1972 , in Ngungu, Masisi Territory, North Kivu Province, DRC. Lt Col Innocent Zimurinda was an officer in the Congrès National pour la Défense du Peuple (CNDP) which was integrated into the Forces Armées de la République Démocratique du Congo (FARDC) in early 2009.

According to multiple sources, Lt Col Innocent Zimurinda, in his capacity as one of the commanders of the FARDC 231st Brigade, gave orders that resulted in the massacre of over 100 Rwandan refugees, mostly women and children, during an April 2009 military operation in the Shalio area.

The UNSC DRC Sanctions Committee’s Group of Experts reported that Lt Col Innocent Zimurinda was witnessed first hand refusing to release three children from his command in Kalehe, on August 29, 2009.

According to multiple sources, Lt Col Innocent Zimurinda, prior to the CNDP’s integration into FARDC, participated in a November 2008 CNDP operation that resulted in the massacre of 89 civilians, including women and children, in the region of Kiwanja.

In March 2010, 51 human rights groups working in eastern DRC posted a complaint online alleging that Lt Col Innocent Zimurinda was responsible for multiple human rights abuses involving the murder of numerous civilians, including women and children, between February 2007 and August 2007. Lt Col Innocent Zimurinda has also been accused in the same complaint to be responsible for the rape of a large number of women and girls.

According to a May 21, 2010, statement by the Special Representative of the Secretary General for Children and Armed Conflict, Innocent Zimurinda has been involved in the arbitrary execution of child soldiers, including during operation Kimia II. According to the same statement, he denied access by the UN Mission in the DRC (MONUC) to screen troops for minors. According to the UNSC DRC Sanctions Committee’s Group of Experts, Lt Col Zimurinda holds direct and command responsibility for child recruitment and for maintaining children within troops under his command.

4. Leodomir MUGARAGU, born in 1954 or 1953, in Kigali, Rwanda or Rushashi (Northern Province), Rwanda. According to open-source and official reporting, Leodomir Mugaragu is the Chief of Staff of the Forces Combattantes Abucunguzi/Combatant Force for the Liberation of Rwanda (FOCA), the FDLR’s armed wing. According to official reporting, Mugaragu is a senior planner for FDLR’s military operations in the eastern DRC.

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PRN: 2010/303

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CONGO SIASA BLOG IS BACK!

New UN Group of Experts Report is Out
Source: Congo Siasa - congosiasa.blogspot.com
Date: Wednesday, 01 December 2010
Excerpt:

Congo Siasa is back, just in time for the new UN Group of Experts' report. It's a great report, chock full of useful information on the situation in the Kivus, and I'll have an exclusive interview with members of the Group here in a few days. For now, some of the highlights of the 190 page document: ...

Read more at congosiasa.blogspot.com authored by Jason Stearns. Here is a copy of Jason's Blogger profile:

I have been working on the conflict in the DR Congo for the past nine years, most recently as the Coordinator of the United Nations Group of Experts on the Congo (2008). I have also worked for Heritiers de la Justice, a local human rights NGO (2001), the UN peacekeeping mission MONUC (2002-2004) and the International Crisis Group (2004-2007). A book I wrote on the conflict, Dancing in the Glory of Monsters, is due to be published soon. I am currently getting my PhD at Yale University.

Chad army routs CPJP rebels in CAR border garrison town Birao - European Union pledges 50 billion euros to Africa's development

2010-12-01T17:17:00.016Z

CHAD'S military repelled rebels from a key border town in northern Central African Republic this week, days after the rebel fighters seized it, officials in both countries said today, Wednesday 01 December.

The African Union said the flare-up in fighting around the town of Birao in recent days had killed several civilians and threatened to complicate preparations for much-delayed elections in CAR, now due in January.

"We affirm that the Chadian army has exercised its right of pursuit by destroying the remaining mercenaries... in the town of Birao," Chad's Army Chief of Staff, General Djionadji, told a news conference late on Tuesday.

A spokesman for the CPJP rebel group said Chadian helicopters and tanks crossed the border from Chad to bombard the town and that rebel fighters retreated on Tuesday.

"We simply evacuated the town because the civilian population, including women and children, were in the process of being killed," CPJP spokesman and commander Issene Abdoulaye told Reuters by telephone.

Full story below.

Chad army routs rebels in Central African Republic
Source: (AP) / Press Trust of India - www.ptinews.com
Date: Wednesday, 01 December 2010 by Staff Writer 17:40 HRS IST

N'Djamena (Chad), Dec 1 (AP) - Chad's army says it has entered the northwest part of neighbouring Central African Republic and pushed out a group of rebels that had attempted to take a town there.

The army chief said late yesterday that soldiers crossed the border to the town of Birao which was occupied by rebels from the Convention of Patriots for Justice and Peace movement. The army says no children or women were killed in the short operation, but did not give details on combatant deaths.

The rebels had entered the town last week.

Chad and the Central African Republic are both impoverished central African nations grappling with the spillover from violence in Sudan's Darfur province.

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Chad army repels rebels in CAR border town
Source: Reuters Africa - af.reuters.com
Date: Wednesday, 01 December 2010 3:52pm GMT

N'DJAMENA (Reuters) - Chad's military repelled rebels from a key border town in northern Central African Republic this week, days after the rebel fighters seized it, officials in both countries said on Wednesday.

The African Union said the flare-up in fighting around the town of Birao in recent days had killed several civilians and threatened to complicate preparations for much-delayed elections in CAR, now due in January.

"We affirm that the Chadian army has exercised its right of pursuit by destroying the remaining mercenaries... in the town of Birao," Chad's Army Chief of Staff, General Djionadji, told a news conference late on Tuesday.

A spokesman for the CPJP rebel group said Chadian helicopters and tanks crossed the border from Chad to bombard the town and that rebel fighters retreated on Tuesday.

"We simply evacuated the town because the civilian population, including women and children, were in the process of being killed," CPJP spokesman and commander Issene Abdoulaye told Reuters by telephone.

Djionadji denied women and children were killed in the raid. No details of casualties were available.

The CPJP rebels, who unlike other rebel groups in CAR have not signed peace accords with President Francois Bozize, seized Birao last week and said they were targeting the capital Bangui far to the south.

A Chad-based U.N. peacekeeping force had handed control of Birao over to state authorities on November 15 as its mission to protect civilians in the two countries comes to an end.

AU President Jean Ping condemned the fighting and called on politicians to work to ensure presidential and legislative elections due in January are not derailed.

Rebel clashes and problems over funding in the former French colony have delayed elections three times already, leaving Bozize in power beyond his initial mandate which ended in June.

Central African Republic is rich in minerals but has been caught up in the conflicts of neighbouring Chad, Sudan and Democratic Republic of Congo.

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Further Reading

Chad army routs rebels in Central African Republic
Washington Post - Wed, 01 Dec 2010

Central African Republic: Security remains fragile ahead of UN troop withdrawal and presidential election
Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre; Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC)
‎Wed, 01 Dec 2010 /Reprinted at ReliefWeb

"Bemba's soldiers raped and killed in the Central African Republic"
Radio Netherlands - ‎Wed, 01 Dec 2010

Bokassa rehabilitated by Central African Republic
BBC News - Wed, 01 Dec 2010

UN - Daily Press Briefing by the Office of the Spokesperson for the Secretary-General
www.un.org - Tues, 30 Nov 2010 / Reprinted at ISRIA. Excerpt:

Question: And also, in Central African Republic, I want… it seems that maybe the Government has taken back control of… but there is this garrison town of Birao that MINURCAT [United Nations Mission in Chad and the Central African Republic] used to somehow have a presence in, that they handed back to the Government on 15 November, it was reported to be overrun by rebels. What’s going to be… One, is there any kind of update, whether from OCHA or otherwise, on what’s the status of that town? And what’s going to be the UN’s ongoing role, if any, in that part of CAR which seems to be -- the civilians are being displaced and rebels are taking and untaking towns?

Acting Deputy Spokesperson: Well, on that, the only thing I’d have to share with you is to reiterate the points made by the Secretary-General in his recent statement, in which he condemned the recent attack on the town of Birao by rebels of the “Convention des patriotes pour la justice et la paix” (CPJP). And he calls on all concerned to exercise maximum restraint to ensure the safety of civilians, as efforts are being made by the national authorities to restore normalcy, and ensure peace and reconciliation among all the parties concerned.

Africa: European Union Pledges 50 Billion Euros to Africa's Development
Liberia Government (Monrovia) - Wed, 01 Dec 2010 /Reprinted at AllAfrica.com

Africa/EU Reinforce Partnership‎
Cameroon Tribune by Richard Kwang Kometa
Wed, 01 Dec 2010 /Reprinted at AllAfrica.com

Tripoli Declaration: economic ties revived‎
Radio Netherlands by Ruben Koops - Wed, 01 Dec 2010

Tripoli Declaration / 3rd Africa EU Summit
European Council - Wed, 01 Dec 2010 /Reprinted by APO. Excerpt:

On Sudan, we emphasise the urgency and importance of ensuring that all elements of the CPA, including those concerning Abyei, South Kordofan and Blue Nile, are implemented in a timely, peaceful and credible manner, in particular the referendum on South Sudan whose results should be accepted by all.

Furthermore, we encourage all parties to progress with the post referendum issues. In this context, we welcome the leadership of the AU in close cooperation with the UN as well as the support provided by the AUHIP led by President Mbeki, and by IGAD. We welcome in particular the progress made and agreements reached on the framework regarding outstanding CPA issues. Our cooperation will continue to build on our common values and goals in pursuit of good governance, democracy and the rule of law. We firmly condemn all unconstitutional changes of governments which, alongside bad governance, are one of the main causes of instability.

Saudi Arabia - Deputy Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Sends Cable of Congratulations to President of Central African Republic
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Ministry of Foreign Affairs - Wed, 01 Dec 2010 /Reprinted at ISRIA

Sudan boycotts Africa-EU summit
Sapa-AFP - ‎‎Wed, 01 Dec 2010 /Reprinted at Mmegi

International war crimes court urges Central African Republic to arrest Sudan's al-Bashir
AP - Wed, 01 Dec 2010, 8:09 am ET /Reprinted at www.canadaeast.com

ICC asks Central African Republic to arrest Bashir on visit
DPA - ‎‎Wed, 01 Dec 2010 8:22 am ET /Reprinted at EARTHtimes.org

Central African Republic must arrest Omar al-Bashir during visit
Amnesty International - Wed Dec 1, 7:48 am ET

Sudan's Bashir cancels CAR trip amid ICC pressure - Summary
DPA - ‎‎Wed, 01 Dec 2010 /Reprinted at EARTHtimes.org

African Union backs Sudan's Bashir
Mail & Guardian - ‎‎Wed, 01 Dec 2010

Key political risks to watch in Congo-FACTBOX
Reuters by Katrina Manson- ‎‎Wed, 01 Dec 2010 /Reprinted by Forexyard

Meet the Arrow Boys, the South Sudanese tribal militia that is the last line of defence against Ugandan rebel group LRA

2010-11-26T15:08:00.007Z

Boys to men as Sudanese villagers take on Lord's Resistance Army
Source: The Sydney Morning Herald - www.smh.com.au
Author: Jason Koutsoukis
Date: Saturday, 27 November 2010

Photo: Protecting their families ... the Arrow Boys Samuel Manese 2nd from left and Deputy Chief Acquila Daniel 4th from right at rear, use an array of weapons against the insurgents. Photo: Kate Geraghty

(KASSIA, Sudan) - Meet the Arrow Boys, the South Sudanese tribal militia that is the last line of defence against Africa's most feared insurgent gang - the Lord's Resistance Army.

Granting rare media access to the Herald in the tiny jungle outpost of Kassia, less than 40 kilometres north of the Congo border, the local Arrow Boys chief, Samuel Manase, said the savagery of the attacks by the LRA was difficult to comprehend.

''They last attacked this village in September,'' Mr Manase said. ''They killed two people and tried to abduct three children but we succeeded in rescuing the children.''

He said the death toll in Kassia from the LRA this year was about 20. ''They kill in different ways. Sometimes people are shot dead, other times men are surrounded by a circle of LRA members beaten to death with clubs. Earlier this year I saw men here being chopped up with pangas [machetes].''

Comprised mostly of men in their teens and early 20s, the Arrow Boys were founded in the South Sudanese state of Western Equatoria last year and employ an unconventional arsenal that includes bows and arrows, spears, even poison darts, in their attempts to fend off LRA attacks.

''We use whatever weapons we can make from the materials here in the forest,'' Mr Manase said. ''We receive some assistance from the government of South Sudan in the form of small arms but it is very little.

''In the last LRA attack in September, it was the wild bees. As they tried to enter Kassia the LRA disturbed several large nests and then the bees set upon them.''

Chased out of Uganda in 2005, the LRA has since marauded through the jungles of South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Central African Republic in search of refuge from the Uganda People's Defence Force.

The LRA chief, Joseph Kony, is now thought to be hiding out in southern Darfur under the auspices of the national government of Sudan, which is opposed to South Sudan's likely secession from Khartoum in a referendum scheduled for January 9.

Kony, 49, is wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity, and styles himself as a Christian ''prophet'' whose mission is to turn Uganda into a theocracy ruled by the Ten Commandments.

Now the LRA is little more than a gang of bandits, with little, if any, real political motive, engaged in a battle for survival.

The Arrow Boys deputy commander in Kassia, Aquila Daniel, said the LRA attacked without warning. ''Their only motive plunder,'' he said. ''They take our food, and they take any other possessions we have including women and children.''

In the event of an attack, an alarm is sounded to mobilise the Arrow Boys.

''We are here hiding in the trees, waiting. The boys have little training; they only want to protect their families,'' Mr Daniel said.

''It is difficult to know how many of the LRA we kill because whenever an LRA member falls, the others in the group are under orders to bring back their bodies to their camp, whatever the cost.

''So occasionally we find traces of blood in the grass, we hope it is evidence that we have killed one of them, but we have never been able to claim a body.''

Emmanuel Samuel, 10, joined the arrow boys in July when he heard the LRA were in the area.

''The village elders told me to stay in the village but I wanted to follow my father,'' Emmanuel said.''I have fired my weapon [a bow and arrow] just once.

''No, I was not afraid because my mother and father were there fighting alongside me.''

Kate Geraghty travelled to Sudan courtesy of Doctors Without Borders

US reveals plan to disarm LRA fighters

2010-11-25T15:59:00.004Z

US President Barack Obama presents strategy to combat Lord's Resistance Army rebels and their leader Joseph Kony in central Africa

US reveals plan to disarm LRA fighters
Source: guardian.co.uk by Xan Rice in Nairobi
Date: Thursday 25 November 2010 13.12 GMT

The Lord's Resistance army leader, Joseph Kony, pictured in 2006. Photograph: Stuart Price/AP

The US government yesterday revealed a plan to disarm Lord's Resistance Army fighters in central Africa and capture or kill their leader, Joseph Kony.

Barack Obama presented a strategy document to Congress designed to "mitigate and eliminate" the threat to civilians posed by one of the world's longest-running and most brutal insurgencies.

While they are unlikely to result in US troops being directly involved in combat operations, the proposed measures should strengthen local military efforts against the LRA and have been welcomed by international human rights groups.

The rebels emerged in northern Uganda 24 years ago with devastating consequences for the local population. In recent years, they have exported their terror to the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan and Central African Republic.

More than 2,300 people in these countries have been killed by LRA fighters over the past two years, with 400,000 civilians forced to flee their homes.

At least 3,000 men, women and children have been abducted – the rebels' primary form of conscription.

Obama's announcement followed the passing of a bill in May that requires the US to support multilateral efforts to subdue the LRA.

The four main objectives of the new plan are to increase protection for civilians, encourage rebel defections, improve humanitarian access and "apprehend or remove from the battlefield Joseph Kony and senior commanders", according to a letter sent to congressmen.

The strategy is a more formal and official version of the one employed by the US for the past two years after it took the lead among western countries in trying to end the rebellion.

In December 2008, the US military provided intelligence and financial support to the Ugandan-led Operation Lightning Thunder, which flushed LRA fighters from their main hideout in Congo, Garamba National Park.

But rebel leaders including Kony – who claims to have messianic powers – escaped the ground and air assault and immediately embarked on a series of massacres in remote villages.

The strategy document said the US had spent more than $23m (£14.5m) on support for the Ugandan military since then, but added that more money was needed.

But ending the insurgency is likely to be extremely difficult, even with more cash and commitment. It was a task that proved beyond the Ugandan military when the LRA operated there for 20 years, and the rebel fighters have proved equally comfortable in countries to the east.

The US-based Enough Project warned in a recent report that the LRA's "propensity for violence remains undiminished" despite having a fighting force of just 400. Ledio Cakaj, a field researcher for the project, said Obama's plan signalled a more hands-on approach by the US military in regional counterinsurgency operations.

"You are not going to see marines on the ground fighting Kony," Cakaj said. "But you are going to see more US troops and contractors on the ground facilitating regional efforts to stop the rebels. It's not a radical move, but it is certainly a positive step."

CAR: CPJP rebels kill 4 soldiers, hold Birao garrison town near border with Chad and Sudan

2010-11-25T15:37:00.011Z

Birao is a garrison town near the border with Chad and Sudan (AFP)

Rebels kill four, hold Central African Republic town
Source: AFP - www.google.com/hostednews
Date: Thursday, 25 November 2010

(BANGUI, Central African Republic) - Rebels killed four soldiers and captured an unknown number of troops in an attack on Birao, the main town of northern Central Africa Republic, the military said on Thursday.

Rebels belonging to the Convention of Patriots for Justice and Peace were still in control of the key town after forcing government troops to withdraw, a military commander told AFP.

"The rebels killed four of our soldiers and wounded some other," he said, declining to be named.

"A certain number of our men were also taken prisoner but we have no exact figures on that."

He said reinforcements were on the way to the area and a counter-attack was planned.

Birao is a garrison town near the borders with Chad and Sudan in an area where attacks by rebel groups occur with regularity.

Rebels of the Lord's Resistance Army staged a raid on the town in October, looting shops and abducting a number of women.

The CPJP has not signed peace accords with the government of President Francois Bozize, unlike most rebel movements in the desperately poor landlocked nation.

The CPJP's founding leader is former government minister Charles Massi. His relatives and aides say that Massi was detained in neighbouring Chad, handed over and tortured to death in January in a Central African prison.

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UPDATE on Friday, 26 November 2010

Central African Republic rebels seize Birao town
Source: BBC News Africa - www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa
Date: Friday, 26 November 2010 at 13:07

Rebels in the Central African Republic have taken over the town of Birao after heavy fighting with the army, a UN official has told the BBC.

The CPJP rebels have seized key strategic places including the armed forces' command base and the airport.

Birao had been under UN guard since June but the peace mission ended two weeks ago.

No casualty figures have been released but one humanitarian worker was killed during the attack, the official said.

The head of the UN humanitarian agency in CAR, Jean-Sebastien Munie said a large number of rebels led the attack on Thursday.

"The rebels' attack took the national forces by surprise."

The CPJP rebels are the only militia which remains outside the country's peace process.

Birao lies in a highly unstable region near the borders with Sudan and Chad, both of which have several rebel groups of their own.

APC: Congolese students and survivors use ICTs to prevent the spread of violence

2010-11-02T16:56:00.008Z

Photo by l’Association des Femmes Solidaires: Survivors of violence undergo training and counseling in Brazzaville (APC)

Congolese students and survivors use ICTs to prevent the spread of violence
Source: Association for Progressive Communications (APC) - www.apc.org
By Sylvie Niombo for APC
BRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo, 27 October 2010:

Association Dynamique Plurielle in Brazzaville, Republic of Congo, will work with 250 female 1st to 3rd year high school students from Savorgnon de Brazzaville High School to fight against sexual harassment in schools by involving teachers and school management. It will organise awareness meetings on the Portella and Potignon Acts, which prohibits relationships between teachers and students and protects minors, during which they will screen video testimonies from survivors of abuse. During the project, students will also send alerts about sexual harassment cases via SMS by the students; and a “listening cell” of the organisation at the high school will actively respond. Educational information about the laws will be sent to 250 students; and trivia questions via SMS and MMS will be sent out participants. Winners will be awarded free internet browsing tickets for the best answer. Students will also be trained on how to use the internet to teach and train others. They will also be sensitized to online privacy and security issues when surfing the internet and using mobile phones.

Association Femmes Solidaires in Brazzaville will train fifteen young mothers infected with HIV/AIDS and survivors of violence in counselling so they can provide psychological support to their peers. Awareness-raising sessions will be held on human rights, targeting 50 women and young mothers infected with HIV/AIDS. Ten of them will be trained in basic computers skills, internet browsing and searching, and writing articles and blogs to document the experiences of violence by HIV-positive women and girls. Radio shows that broadcast the testimonies of these survivors of violence will be produced with the assistance of female journalists and members of the organisation. These radio programs will be reproduced on CDs and distributed to other organisations for their advocacy and educational activities, and uploaded to the internet.

Jeunes Infrastructure et Développement (CJID) will work to reduce violence against women and girls in Kinkala, an area that was affected by armed conflict until 2003, through awareness and education on ICTs. Twenty female soldiers and policewomen will be sensitised about violence against women. Around100 survivors of violence will be reached by this project; from which 35 will be trained in basic computer skills and internet use. They will create a listening space for survivors at their office, and provide mobile internet access to the people of Kinkala, especially young students. The project will also produce video testimonials with a team of survivors of violence, which will be screened at awareness meetings and shared with other organisations. There will also be an SMS contest for the best testimonies, and a moderated blog will be put in place to give voices to the project beneficiaries on the web.

Comptoir Juridique Junior will work with 200 students in the Mpaka Secondary School and the OCH Technical High School in Pointe-Noire to fight against and prevent sexual harassment in schools. Their actions will involve teachers and school management. Students will send alerts on cases of sexual harassment via SMS, and different measures will be taken after a consultation. Competitions for testimonies by survivors of violence via SMS and MMS will be held with 200 students, and the best testimonies will be awarded with training on the use of the internet for learning purposes. The project also educates students on privacy and security online when surfing the internet and using mobile phones. A network of students from both institutions will be created before the end of the project.

Handicapés Sans Frontières in Pointe-Noire will gather some sixty female journalists, women and girls with disabilities to educate, denounce, and find solutions to end violence against them, as well as help them break their silence. The organisation will hold awareness sessions on women’s rights and how to fight violence against women in the media and women’s circles for those with disabilities. They will be trained in basic computer skills and the internet in order to communicate about violence through blogs, photos and mobile phones. They will learn how to record sounds with mobile phones, how to take and upload photos and how to upload video and audio to the internet. Women and girls with disabilities and survivors of violence will also use the internet to advocate for a space where they can express themselves. Female journalists involved in the project will present radio and television programs that demonstrate the magnitude and call for action on violence against women and girls with disabilities.

As part of its work towards achieving the Millennium Development Goal #3 (MDG3), the Association for Progressive Communicaitons Women’s Networking Support Programme (APC WNSP) is providing a small grants fund for projects working with women technology and raising awareness about violence against women in over 30 communities. Funds from the MDG3 grant are going directly towards supporting over 60 local, primarily community based organisations to implement projects that use ICTs to end violence against women and building their capacity to do so.

The Tack Back the Tech! fund is a part of the APC women’s programme Take Back the Tech! to end violence against women project, which falls under the APC’s work towards achieving the third Millennium Development Goal on equality for women. A total of $20 000 dollars have been disbursed to twelve country partners for redistribution to local and grassroots organisations that are working with women and ICTs.

(END/2010)

Hat tip: www.afrora.com

ICC - France arrests Rwandan rebel leader Callixte Mbarushimana in Paris for war crimes committed in DR Congo’s Kivu province in 2009

2010-10-31T11:18:00.023Z

ACTING on a warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC), French police arrested Callixte Mbarushimana, vice-president of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), on Monday, 11 October 2010, in his Paris apartment. He stands charged of 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity in DRC in 2009.

The ICC alleges that Mbarushimana planned a series of crimes from his base in France with the intention of creating a humanitarian catastrophe, then extorting concessions of political power from the international community.

Almost two million people are internally displaced in eastern DRC’s Kivu provinces, in large part due to the activities of the FDLR.

Full story below.

Photo: Callixte Mbarushimana, seen here in 2004 (AFP)

Analysis: Rebel leader’s arrest just one step in fight against impunity in DRC
Source: IRIN - www.irinnews.org
Date: Thursday, 21 October 2010:

(LONDON) - The recent arrest in Europe of a senior Rwandan militia leader is a welcome step in the fight against impunity in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) but real progress in the protection of civilians depends on the apprehension of commanders on the ground, according to analysts.

Acting on a warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC), French police arrested Callixte Mbarushimana, vice-president of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), on 11 October in Paris. He stands charged of 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity in DRC in 2009.

Almost two million people are internally displaced in eastern DRC’s Kivu provinces, in large part due to the activities of the FDLR.

International and local human rights groups applauded Mbarushimana’s arrest which comes after a long and controversial military campaign to stamp out the Hutu-dominated group that formed in DRC after the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

But they suggest impact on the ground - where a brutal campaign of murder and rape allegedly committed by FDLR soldiers has blighted the lives of civilians - will be minimal.

“It is clear from the latest military operations that the FDLR is weakened, and the arrest of individuals in Europe just weakens them even further,” said Anneke Van Woudenberg, senior researcher at Human Rights Watch.

“But will it stop them attacking civilians? I fear not. I think that we’ve seen in the past that it doesn’t have an immediate impact on behaviour on the ground, because there has been this division between the political movement [in Europe] and the military leadership in the field.”

Mbarushimana took over the FDLR’s political wing following the November 2009 arrests of FDLR President Ignace Murwanashyaka and his deputy Straton Musoni in Germany. They remain in German custody charged, under the principle of universal jurisdiction, with bearing command responsibility for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by FDLR troops eastern DRC.

ICC allegations

The ICC alleges that Mbarushimana planned a series of crimes from his base in France with the intention of creating a humanitarian catastrophe, then extorting concessions of political power from the international community.

ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo said the latest arrest could help demobilize the FDLR “After 16 years of continuous violence, this could be an opportunity to finally demobilize the group,” said ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo in a press release. “Their leaders are gone.”

But not everyone is convinced that FDLR will give up their fight so easily. Fidel Bafilemba, the eastern DRC field researcher for the Enough Project, says the soldiers on the ground care little for international warrants for European leaders. “Why should this [latest] arrest make a difference that the arrest of Ignace Murwanashyaka didn't make?” he said.

In fact, one of the most shocking incidents in DRC’s recent history occurred long after Murwanashyaka and Musoni were taken into custody - the rape of hundreds of women near Walikale in August, allegedly by FDLR soldiers and their Congolese Mayi-Mayi allies.

Many recent atrocities attributed to the FDLR have come in apparent response to the military campaigns against them by the Rwandan and DRC armies assisted by the UN peace-keeping force in DRC, known as MONUSCO (formerly MONUC).

“What I fear with FDLR is that they have shown when under military pressure they attack Congolese civilians,” said Van Woudenberg. “The recent rapes in Walikale are a prime example of the FDLR and their Mayi Mayi allies punishing Congolese people for their perceived support for these military operations against them.”

Independent DRC analyst Jason Stearns describes the military approach to date as clumsy and says it has worsened the humanitarian catastrophe in the east. He is also unconvinced that targeting Europe-based FDLR will stamp out the rebels.

“We should crack down on the diaspora, but let’s not lose sight of the fact that in the larger scheme of things it’s not going to be by any stretch of the imagination the key factor in dealing with the FDLR,” said Stearns, the former head of the UN Group of Experts on Congo. “There are other much more important issues to deal with than the diaspora.”

He believes that MONUSCO and others should be reaching out to the commanders on the ground who were not involved in the Rwandan genocide - many of whom are tired of life in the forest and the constant military pressure. “There has been relatively little outreach to them,” he said.

“We need to find out who the genocidaires [those who took part in Rwanda’s 1994 genocide] are in the FDLR, but we just don’t know. It’s hard to engage in this outreach to commanders if you are operating with this lack of information.”

DRC army accused of crimes against humanity Stearns proposes third country exile for FDLR members found not to be involved in violations of international law and who do not want to return to Rwanda.

“Powerful signal”

International Crisis Group’s central Africa senior analyst, Guillaume Lacaille, agrees that military offensives alone will not end the violence and that FDLR military leaders in the field should be given the opportunity to relocate, but within the DRC.

“Those who accept to leave the FDLR could be relocated in a western province of the Congo in exchange for disarmament, rather than accept immediate repatriation to Rwanda,” he said.

Lacaille, however, insists the arrest of Mbarushimana and the others is also an important part of the process of bringing peace to eastern DRC.

“It sends a powerful signal that directing from Europe a criminal group operating in Congo will have serious consequences,” he said. “In the past, leaders of armed groups were led to believe that they could operate safely from comfortable Western capitals. The ICC and the governments of Germany and France demonstrated clearly that it is not possible any more.”

Enough’s Bafilemba also sees the new ICC case as a positive step towards ending impunity in DRC, but expects more from the court. That means warrants for crimes committed by all sides in the conflict including the national army which this week came under pressure from Margot Wallstrom, the UN envoy on sexual violence in conflict, who accused its soldiers of murdering and raping villagers in Walikale.

Van Woudenberg, meanwhile, is calling on the Rwandan government to do its part in ending the violence.

“As long as the political space in Rwanda is not opened up to the Hutu, the problem of the FDLR will continue,” she said. The lasting solution to this problem of Hutu and their political space is Rwanda and Rwanda will need to open this political space.”

Rwandan President Paul Kagame responded to this oft-voiced view in his 6 October swearing-in speech that followed his 93 percent landslide victory in an August election:

“…That there is no political space … what do you mean? The political space is well and fully occupied by the people of this country. And if the people of this country has spoken in such numbers and freely, who are you to question anything they have said? Where do you come from? From Mars?” lc/am/cb

- - -

A Win Against Impunity: Callixte Mbarushimana Arrested in Paris
Source: warcrimes.foreignpolicyblogs.com
Written by: Brandon Henander
Date: Tuesday, 12 October 2010. Excerpt:

[...] What many find most offensive is that Mbarushimana was a U.N. employee during the Rwandan genocide; he used that priviledge to further the genocide by identifying employees to be killed, identifying safe-havens designated by the U.N. and evacuation points to Hutu militias; and personally carried out genocidal murders himself. Up to a dozen eye witnesses have come forward testifying that Mbarushimana supervised killings of Tutsis during the genocide and/or pulled the trigger himself.

The ICTR failed to sign his indictment in 2001 alleging that his role in the genocide was not large enough to warrant prosecution in front of the special tribunal, even though he was implicated in over 30 murders and grossly abused his position as an international civil servant. Unfortunately he went on to help mastermind killings and other war crimes and crimes against humanity that rose to the level of severity worthy of consideration before an international criminal venue.

- - -

Related Reports

Court refuses to release Callixte Mbarushimana from detention

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►

French court rejects request to free Rwandan rebel leader

‎
AFP - 3 days ago

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Los Angeles Times - 23 Oct 2010

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Voice of America - 22 Oct 2010

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FranceToday.com - Patrick Lattin - 22 Oct 2010

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Rwandan War Crimes Suspect Makes First Appearance in French Court

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ICC: Sudanese rebel leaders charged with war crimes and slaying of peacekeepers at Haskanita, N. Darfur, W. Sudan

2010-10-31T11:00:00.002Z

ON Friday 22 October 2010, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued a statement confirming that Darfur rebel group leaders Abdallah Banda Abakaer Nourain and Saleh Mohammed Jerbo Jamus (Jerbo) are charged with, quote:

three war crimes (violence to life, in the form of murder, whether committed or attempted; intentionally directing attacks against personnel, installations, materials, units, and vehicles involved in a peacekeeping mission; and pillaging) allegedly committed during an attack carried out on 29 September, 2007, against the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), a peace-keeping mission stationed at the Haskanita Military Group Site, in the locality of Umm Kadada, North Darfur. It is alleged that the attackers killed 12 and severely wounded 8 soldiers, destroyed communications facilities and other materials and appropriated property belonging to AMIS.

Confirmation of charges hearing in the case against Banda and Jerbo to start on 8 December, 2010. The hearing was initially scheduled to start on 22 November, 2010.

Click here to read full story at Sudan Watch, parent site of Congo Watch.

Photo: Jerbo (L) and Banda (R) © ICC-CPI/ Toussaint Kluiters

Hotel Rwanda inspiration Paul Rusesabagina accused of funding terrorism - Rwandan police arrest opposition leader Victoire Ingabire

2010-10-28T17:29:00.008+01:00

Paul Rusesabagina who inspired the film Hotel Rwanda has been accused of funding terrorism and seeking to overthrow the country's government.

Mr Rusesabagina, who in 2005 was awarded the US Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country's highest civilian honour by former US President George W. Bush, insists he has done nothing wrong.

Rwandan police say they have arrested the country's most prominent opposition leader Victoire Ingabire and are accusing her of forming a terrorist organisation.

Full story below.

Hotel Rwanda inspiration accused of funding terrorism
Source: The Daily Telegraph.co.uk
By Aislinn Laing in Johannesburg
Published: 1:56PM BST 28 Oct 2010

The man who inspired the film Hotel Rwanda has been accused of funding terrorism and seeking to overthrow the country's government.

Photo: Paul Rusesabagina

Photo: Actor Don Cheadle (right) played the part of Paul Rusesabagina in the film Hotel Rwanda (Reuters)

Paul Rusesabagina, who was declared a hero by the international community for shielding hundreds of Tutsis from the 1994 in his hotel, is alleged to have sent money from the US to the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a Hutu-majority rebel group whose commanders were implicated in the killings.

Mr Rusesabagina, who was played by Don Cheadle in the film, insists he has not sent money to Rwanda for at least seven years and dismissed the allegations as part of a smear campaign against him because he opposed the government of Paul Kagame, the Rwandan president, in the past.

Martin Ngoga, Rwanda's most senior prosecutor, claimed he had hard evidence that Mr Rusesabagina, 56, sent money to two FDLR commanders in Burundi and Tanzania via the Western Union from San Antonio, Texas, where he has a home.

"Those who want to continue considering him as a hero can go on," Mr Ngoga said. "We consider him a serious criminal suspect and we are challenging whoever speaks on his behalf to tell us whether he never sent money to these FDLR commanders we have in custody."

It is alleged that the money was designed to fund the recruiting of fighters for a new military wing of FDU-Inkingi, a Hutu opposition party headed by Victoire Ingabire.

Miss Ingabire was remanded in custody earlier this month on charges of forming a terrorist group. Mr Ngoga alleged that the FDLR commanders in custody have given evidence against both Miss Ingabire and Mr Rusesabagina.

Mr Rusesabagina, who in 2005 was awarded the US Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country's highest civilian honour by former US President George W. Bush, insists he has done nothing wrong.

"It is the latest step in a campaign against me by the Rwandan government that has included public insults, lies and physical harassment," he said.

"My foundation is advocating for a truth, justice and reconciliation process to try to foster sustainable peace in Rwanda ... but anyone who opposes Kagame inside or outside the country is treated with this kind of harassment."

No formal charges have yet been filed against him.

More than 500,000 Rwandans, mostly ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus, were killed in Rwanda's genocide.
Mr Kagame, an ethnic Tutsi, has tried to downplay the role of ethnicity in post-genocide Rwanda, and people in the country rarely refer to themselves as Hutu or Tutsi and can face charges for speaking publicly about ethnicity.

But he has been criticised by human rights groups who accuse his regime of iron-fisted control and of silencing opposition politicians and media outlets with arrests and attacks in the run up to August president election.

- - -

Rwandan police arrest opposition leader
Source: Telegraph.co.uk
Date: Thursday, 14 October 2010

Photo: Rwandan authorities say Ms Ingabire, pictured, was implicated during investigations into the activities of a former commander of a Hutu militia group. (AFP/GETTY)

Victoire Ingabire was arrested on Thursday, police said in a statement. Human rights groups accuse the Rwandan government of using allegations of terrorism to stifle opposition.

Rwandan authorities say Ms Ingabire was implicated during investigations into the activities of a former commander of a Hutu militia group operating in neighbouring Congo who was arrested on Wednesday.

Police claim this is the military wing of Ms Ingabire's party.

Ms Ingabire returned to Rwanda in January after 16 years to challenge President Paul Kagame who was re-elected in August elections. She was barred from contesting the poll.

Rwandan police say they have arrested the country's most prominent opposition leader and are accusing her of forming a terrorist organisation.

UN battles arms trafficking in Congo - DRC and Ugandan armies are cooperating with UN forces

2010-09-24T11:42:00.000+01:00

U.N. battles arms trafficking in Congo
From UPI - September 23, 2010 at 4:13 PM

UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 23 (UPI) -- U.N. peacekeepers are patrolling the Congo-Uganda border amid reports that the Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army is trafficking arms in the area, an official said.

"This concern stems from information on the seizure in Uganda of vehicles transporting arms," Lt. Col. Amadou Gueye, a spokesman for the U.N. Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, said Wednesday at a weekly news briefing in Kinshasa, U.N. News reported.

"Measures to halt this traffic include first of all continuing to patrol this frontier with our units deployed in the sector," Gueye said, adding that the DRC and Ugandan armies are cooperating with U.N. forces.

The LRA operated in Uganda for 20 years before expanding its operations into Congo and Sudan. The group is accused of war crimes including mutilations and the use of child soldiers, U.N. News said.

DR Congo: 6 civilians killed in LRA attacks -MONUSCO

2010-09-24T10:32:00.007+01:00

DR Congo: MORE CIVILIANS KILLED IN LRA REBEL ATTACKS
Source: Missionary International Service News Agency (MISNA)
Date: 23 September 2010 - via ReliefWeb

At least six more civilians were killed this week in attacks in the Orientale Province, in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, by Ugandan rebels of the LRA (Lord's Resistance Army) headed by the visionary Joseph Kony.

According to the United Nations stabilisation mission in DR-Congo (MONUSCO), three civilians, including the village chief, were killed on September 15 in Liakanda, in the Dungu district.

The following day a group of traders was attacked in Nambili, in the Haut-Uélé district, by rebels who killed three and abducted another two, looting their belongings.

The MONUSCO also refers of the possible death of another civilian the day after in Ngilima.

The UN stabilisation mission also expressed 'concern" over reports of a possible LRA involvement in arms trafficking toward Uganda, through Sudan and DR-Congo.

The LRA, originally active in North Uganda, took refuge in the forests of the Congolese Orientale Province, launching attacks, killing and abducting civilians over the past three years in DR-Congo, the Central African Republic and South Sudan.

The indiscriminate attacks by the rebels have caused wide discontent among the civil society and religious leaders of the three countries. The Congolese and Ugandan governments in the past days announced new joint operations against the rebels. [BO]

Sudan seeks Congo's support for candidacy to head ATU

2010-09-23T18:54:00.002+01:00

Sudan seeks Congo's support for candidacy to head ATU
From Afrique en ligne (afriquejet.com) - Thursday, 23 September 2010:

(Brazzaville, Congo) - Sudan is seeking the support of Congo for its (Sudan's) candidacy for the leadership of the African Telecommunication Union (ATU). The Sudanese Minister of Communications, Information and Technologies, Ms Theresa Iricio Iro, arrived in Brazzaville Wednesday to make the request for support.

She was received by her Congolese counterpart, Thierry Moungalla.

Congo is hosting, from Thursday (23Sept), the 3rd ordinary session of the ATU conference, at which the new leadership of the union will be elected.

Uganda offers to train DR Congo troops

2010-09-22T14:03:00.001+01:00

THE Ugandan and Congolese armies are conducting joint operations against the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels in DR Congo and the Central African Republic.

Congolese troops fighting rebels from the Allied Defence Forces (ADF) in eastern DR Congo close to the Ugandan border are benefiting from Ugandan intelligence.

Ugandan Defence Minister Crispus Kiyonga and his Congolese counterpart, Charles Mwando, who will meet again in November, agreed to do everything possible to neutralise the LRA and the ADF, a joint statement said.

In another recent sign of willingness to cooperate, the Ugandan government in June arrested a rebel chief operating in eastern DR Congo, Gadi Ngabo, the head of the Patriotic Front for the Liberation of Congo (FPLC).

Full story below.

Uganda offers to train DR.Congo troops
(AFP) – Tuesday, 21 September 2010

KAMPALA — Uganda has offered to train troops of the Democratic Republic of Congo, its former foe, army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Felix Kulayigye said Tuesday.

"It is the first time that Uganda is offering her military academies to train Congolese government soldiers," Kulayigye told AFP, adding the offer followed a two-day bilateral meeting that ended Sunday in Kampala.

The meeting was between Ugandan Defence Minister Crispus Kiyonga and his Congolese counterpart, Charles Mwando.
In recent years Kampala has trained a plethora of Congolese rebel groups that fought in DR Congo against the Kinshasa government, other proxy groups or amongst themselves.

Kulayigye said it was too early to talk about the training timetable or the number of troops who will participate.

"Uganda offered training space at its military academies to DRC forces. The timetable is to be done by the Congolese when they are able to implement the decision," he said, adding that troop numbers still need to be worked out.

The meeting at the weekend was a follow-up to the Ngurdoto agreement signed by Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni and his Congolese counterpart, Joseph Kabila, in Tanzania in 2007 to normalise relations between the two countries.

The Ugandan and Congolese armies are conducting joint operations against the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels in DR Congo and the Central African Republic.

Congolese troops fighting rebels from the Allied Defence Forces (ADF) in eastern DR Congo close to the Ugandan border are benefiting from Ugandan intelligence.

The two ministers, who will meet again in November, agreed to do everything possible to neutralise the LRA and the ADF, a joint statement said.

In another recent sign of willingness to cooperate, the Ugandan government in June arrested a rebel chief operating in eastern DR Congo, Gadi Ngabo, the head of the Patriotic Front for the Liberation of Congo (FPLC).

Ugandan troops and their rebel allies invaded DR Congo twice, in 1996 and again in 1998. Even after they withdrew in large numbers over the period 2002-2003, Ugandan troops have made numerous incursions into DR Congo, mostly in pursuit of LRA rebels.

S. Sudan: SPLM accuses NCP of supporting LRA to disrupt S. Sudan independence vote

2010-09-22T10:56:00.000+01:00

SPLM accuses NCP of supporting LRA to disrupt S. Sudan independence vote
From Bor Globe Network www.borglobe.com - 22 September 2010 at 1:08 pm by Mabior Philip

Juba, Sudan (Borglobe) - The Sudan People’s Liberation Movement has accused her peace partner of providing a continued support to the Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army rebels in a ploy to disrupt the conduct of an independence vote in Southern Sudan.

In a press briefing yesterday at the SPLM Southern Sector secretariat, the Acting Deputy Secretary General for Southern sector, Antipas Nyok Kucha, said the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) arm the rebels, to later create instability in the south.

“They are armed wings, armed militia, being funded by the NCP to sabotage the system in the south”, Antipas Nyok told reporters.

“Don’t think LRA is a rebel army fighting against the Ugandan government but it is a support militia backing the SAF to destabilize people in the south”.

He said these destructive plans are responsible for the quest of Southerners for an independent nation in an internationally supervised self determination referendum January next year.

“If you are suffering from cancer and the cancer is threatening to finish up your body, what do you do?” Nyok wandered. “You have to go to the doctor so that the arm is cut away”, he said, implying that the doctor is the referendum.

In a related development, the SPLM rejected the NCP’s proposal of dual citizenship for the people of Abyei. “I am telling our people, these are provocative statements”, he said. “It is the constitution to set citizenship of the people and not any individual to get and propose dual citizenship”, he stressed. There is no home that can be co-owned but it must have its owner, he added.

Uganda, DRCongo seek new ways to fight insurgents - Nun offers refuge in Sudan - Religious leaders call on UN - LRA wants peace talks resumed

2010-09-19T23:47:00.030+01:00

BEFORE glancing through the following round-up of 21 news reports regarding the LRA (Lord's Resistance Army), please click here (and wait for short advert to end) to view an important video report at TIME.com by Ed Robbins reporting from Western Equatoria, south Sudan. The report, entitled "NUN OFFERS REFUGE FROM VIOLENCE IN SUDAN", features Sister Giovanna, mother superior at a Catholic mission in Ezo, South Sudan, who provides refuge for villagers fleeing vicious attacks by soldiers of the LRA.

I say, compassion is the greatest healer. Upon viewing the video I wanted to reach out my hands and shake Sister Giovanna's hand and give her a big hug for being so compassionate and courageous in speaking out and asking important questions. I think people who are abducted and enslaved by the LRA should be viewed as victims and prisoners of war in urgent need of rescuing and a care plan that includes treatment for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). I am still thinking of poor Moses, wondering who is helping him deal with his nightmares.
- - -

Uganda, DRCongo seek new ways to fight insurgents
From AFP
Sunday, 19 September 2010

(KAMPALA) - Defence leaders from Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo are meeting Sunday in Kampala to discuss new ways to combat rebel groups in the region, notably the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA).

"We will discuss security matters, especially border insurgency by negative forces, the Lord's Resistance Army and others," Ugandan Defence Minister Crispus Kiyonga told AFP.

"We expect this meeting to come up with comprehensive measures to deal with negative forces to ensure there is peace in the region, and to see that there is smooth movement of goods and services between the two countries," he added. Tens of thousands of people have been killed in two decades of fighting since LRA chief Joseph Kony took up arms, initially against the Ugandan government.

Long since driven out of Uganda, the guerrillas have carved out a vast region of control in the dense forests of northeast DR Congo, as well as southern Sudan and the Central African Republic, and their insurgency has been marked by appalling violence against civilians.

- - -

Uganda, Congo discuss new plot against LRA
From The New Vision (www.newvision.co.ug) by Henry Mukasa
Sunday, 19 September, 2010

UGANDA and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have vowed to work together to annihilate the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebels who are threatening the security of the two countries.

Defence minister Dr. Crispus Kiyonga and DRC’s defence and veterans’ minister Charles Mwando made the declaration after a meeting in Munyonyo on Saturday.

The ministers met under the Ngurdoto agreement signed by President Yoweri Museveni and his counterpart, Joseph Kabila in Tanzania on September 8, 2007. The ministers will meet again in November.

According to a statement, the ministers reviewed the security situation along the border and commended each other for the joint operations against the LRA rebels in Congo.

They also thanked each other for the on-going operations against the Alliance Defence Forces (ADF) leaders in Eastern DRC.

“In this respect, they agreed to do everything possible to neutralise Joseph Kony, his group, and the ADF rebels,” the statement said.

Kony is the leader of the LRA rebels, who fought an atrocious war in northern Uganda, maiming, looting property, raping and abducting people.

Kiyonga stated that Uganda was ready to support efforts against lawless Ugandans destabilising peace and security in the region.

Mwando thanked the Ugandan government for arresting rebels like Gen. Gadi Ngabo. Ngabo, the leader of the Patriotic Front in Congo, had declared war on the government of Joseph Kabila, claiming it had failed to keep its promises.

Uganda offered training space at its military academies to DRC forces.

Yesterday, Mwando visited the Kimaka Senior Command and Staff College in Jinja. He was briefed on the history, objectives, course modules and administrative structure of the college.

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Bishops tell US leaders military option won't work against rebels
From Sunday Monitor (www.monitor.co.ug) by Mark Kirumira, Washington
Friday, 17 September 2010 at 06:45

Two Ugandan bishops have told US officials that regional dialogue with the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels would work better than a military option against it.

"The issue is no longer the LRA and Uganda," Archbishop John Baptist Odama of Gulu told Catholic News Service in Washington on Wednesday. "The issue now is regional."

Archbishop Odama has headed the Gulu Archdiocese in northern Uganda since 1999 and, during that time, has worked to end hostilities between the UPDF and the LRA.

He travelled to Washington with Anglican Bishop MacLeord Baker Ochola II, retired bishop of Kitgum.

The bishops recently said they do not oppose the LRA Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act, which US President Barack Obama signed into law in May, but were urging US officials to end the use of force in dealing with the LRA.

The cited numerous occasions on which force did not work against the rebel group.
Efforts by the government to make peace with the rebels, on four times, through dialogue have yielded nothing with LRA leader Joseph Kony refusing to sign the peace agreement --- the last being in 2007.

The break in the talks forced the UPDF to launch an operation christened Lightening Thunder on the rebels’ bases in DR Congo.

But an LRA rebels’ delegation has reportedly written to the United Nations secretary general Ban Ki-Moon appealing for the resumption of the talks with the government.

The bishops met with State Department officials, who have until November to develop a strategy for disarming the LRA and they also met with congressional leaders.

"We are afraid," Archbishop Odama said.

"Let us bring [their] leaders together -- the new stakeholders."

Bishop Ochola said those opposed to peace -- those who advocate continued fighting -- should also be invited to the dialogue. He said the Acholi Religious Leaders Peace Initiative leaders have offered to mediate multiple times.

Since late 2008, the LRA have killed more than 2,500 civilians in southern Sudan. About 90,000 Sudanese in Western Equatoria province have been displaced from their homes, and 25,000 refugees from Congo and Central African Republic have sought refuge in the province.

Archbishop Odama and Bishop Ochola said capturing or killing Kony would not necessarily end the conflict, because the situation is so complex and includes splinter groups and tribal conflicts.

Kony and his bandits have shifted their base from northern Uganda and now operate in southern Sudan, Congo and the Central African Republic.

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Army dismisses rebel call for fresh talks
From The New Vision (www.newvision.co.ug)
Friday, 17 September, 2010

THE army says calls by the Lords Resistance Army rebels to the UN to initiate fresh peace talks with the government is diversionary and intended to buy time.

UPDF 4th Division Intelligence Officer, Major Victor Opira says peace talks between the government and the LRA were concluded and what is remaining is for the LRA leader, Joseph Kony to sign the final peace agreement document.

He says government is aware that the LRA is not serious and has always wanted to seek for survival means.

Opira also revealed that the strength and capacity of the LRA have greatly been reduced and weakened in the recent operations against the LRA.

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South Sudan army calls for quick provision of security information
From Sudan Tribune (www.sudantribune.com) by Ngor Arol Garang
Friday, 17 September 2010

September 16, 2010 (MALAKAL) - The Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) on Thursday called for the quick and timely provision of security information, saying that delays in passing on sensitive information to relevent authorities in the region, such as that relating to security, results in delays in crucial intervention.

Photo: SPLA spokesperson Gen Kuol Deim Kuol (Photo Ajang Monychol)

Kuol Deim Kuol, official spokesman of the SPLA told Sudan Tribune from Juba that the latest Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) attack in western Equatoria, occurred just eight miles away from Yambio, capital of the state and the information about their presence was not passed onto the SPLA forces in the area early enough.

The LRA is a northern Ugandan rebel group with no coherent demands which continues to commit atrocities across the region. At its centre is a messianic cult around its leader, the International Criminal Court charged, Josephy Kony.

“It was made known to our forces after the emergence of reports that civilians have sighted them moving about in the area before the attack,” said Kuol. He explained that the provision of information is important as it helps in preparation and proper positioning of armed forces, in order to provide quick and timely intervention.

“You see, in Western Bahr el Ghazal, LRA has limited activities because once elements associated with it are sighted by the civilians; they give information very fast to our forces. This is what is required. Cooperation in coordination and provision of security is very important,” he added.

Kuol pointed out that the LRA is active in the area, especially in the two counties of Nzara and Yambio because of lack coordination and information sharing. “We have deployed enough manpower but this is not what counts. What counts is not the number of security forces but provision of information on time and logistics. There is need for cooperation in this area,” he added.

Kuol also expressed concern over the presence of the LRA off southern soil: “The LRA operates from the Democratic Republic of Congo and our forces have no mandate to enter DRC territory. This is one. The other issue is logistics for the movement of our forces. The last and most important of all is provision of information on time. Intelligence play central role and this is what counts.”

He made an appeal following a report urging the ministry of SPLA and veteran affairs by the regional parliament to increase deployment of the armed forces in Western Equatoria State.

On Wednesday Aleu Ayieny Aleu, chair of the special committee for security and public order responded to a motion previously raised by Bernado K. Martin, a member of parliament, on increased activities and operation of LRA in the area.

The security and public order report was deliberated by undersecretary of the ministry of SPLA and veteran affairs, Bior Ajang and Obote Mamur on behalf of the SPLA chief of general staff, reulsting in eight recommendations.

The committee noted that the inaccessibility of roads was leading to the formation of LRA hideouts. That it is operating in Democratic Republic of Congo and Southern Darfur in Sudan. Lack of coordination and sharing of information on operation and activities of the LRA at the border areas was observed.

The comittee report also indicated that the LRA has established close relationships with unlawful groups, citing cattle raiders and nomads like Ombororo. TIt also suggested that the LRA is receiving logistical and military support from Khartoum’s Sudanese Armed Forces through its liaison office in South Darfur.

It accused the ruling National Congress Party of colloding with the LRA to destabilize the region by undermining the implementation of the CPA in regard to the preperations for the upcoming referendum.

To maintain peace in the region, the parliament recommended that the SPLA end the armed incursion of the LRA and Ombororo nomads wandering about in the region and called on the Government of Southern Sudan (GoSS) to make every effort to support operations of the armed forces, particularly in combating the LRA.

The parliament further urged the ministry of SPLA and veteran affairs to increase the number of the armed forces in the area, to prevent flow of illegal arms and movement, as well as to monitor allegations of the smuggling of arms.

It called for the construction of security roads in order to facilitate the quick movement of the military against illegal armed groups in the region, in particular the LRA.

The regional parliament finally called on the SPLM controlled GoSS to lead regional efforts to combat rebels, in collaboration with the Khartoum’s Government of National Unity, Uganda, Democratic of Congo and Central Africa Republic and in the hope of mediating peace with the LRA. (ST)

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The Invisible Children Organization Makes a Stop at South Walton High School
From www.wjhg.com
Thursday, 16 September 2010

These young members of the Invisible Children's Organization know that no child should live in fear of being abducted, mutilated, or killed. Activists groups are trying to shed light on the destruction caused by the longest running war in Africa's history ...
Reporter: Meagan O'Halloran
Email Address: meagan.ohalloran@wjhg.com

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Sudan: Stop the suffering - Bishop’s international call for fresh approach to LRA threat
From Aid to the Church in Need (members4.boardhost.com)
Press release by John Pontifex
Wednesday, 15 September 2010

CHURCH and civic representatives from four key African countries have signed a declaration appealing for international action to stop guerrilla forces terrorising the region.

About 30 community leaders made up of senior clergy and government representatives put their signature to a communiqué calling on national and international leaders to do more to prevent attacks by the Lords Resistance Army in Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda and the Central African Republic.

The declaration calls on the countries’ governments to work together to quell the LRA threat, demanding that further pressure on the four nations be applied by the EU, the UK, the USA and the UN.

Further articles outlined in the document include an appeal for more humanitarian support to help refugees and displaced people and there is a plea for a resumption of peace talks to bring the LRA threat to an end.

Photo: Bishop Eduardo Hiiboro Kussala of Tombura-Yambio, South Sudan

In an interview with Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need, Bishop Eduardo Hiiboro Kussala of Tombura-Yambio, who organised the conference, stressed the continuing threat posed by the LRA.

Speaking yesterday (Tuesday, 14th September) at the end of the four-day meeting, Bishop Hiiboro underlined the need for international pressure to step up security in the region.

He told ACN: “We have been forgotten by our own government, forgotten by the international community and this means the LRA think they can do anything they like.

“Think of the number of people who have fled their homes, the number of people who have lost their lives and the number of people left as orphans.

“The whole state [of Western Equatoria] is living in panic – not just in South Sudan but in the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda. It is just too much.”

Bishop Hiiboro said a reminder of the LRA threat came just days before the conference got underway last week when eight people were hacked to death by machetes.

A further 14 were badly wounded, some seriously, during the attack which took place in Yambio, the regional capital of Western Equatoria State where the bishop is based and where the conference was held.

Stressing the gruesome violence typical of LRA attacks, Bishop Hiiboro said: “The impact of the LRA is terrible. There are huge numbers of refugees and displaced people trying to escape attack.

“They destroy property, leave children as orphans and, with so many leaving, there are no schools or social services.”

But, underlining the limitations of a military response to the LRA threat, he said: “We have seen what happens by following the military way.

“People continue to suffer and die. We want to say that we need another option – an option for peaceful dialogue.”

A year ago, the remains of six people were discovered nailed to a tree close to Yambio in an atrocity that was likened to a crucifixion scene. Again the LRA was implicated.

Amid widespread reports pointing to LRA collusion with Sudan President Omar al Bashir’s Islamist regime in the capital, Khartoum, Bishop Hiiboro said it was unclear who was backing the insurgents.

He added: “There are people who give them weapons, food and enable them to have telephone communications.

“It is difficult to say who helps them. It is obvious that they receive significant support because they are so very well equipped.”

The LRA issue is expected to have a major bearing on the outcome of the long-awaited referendum on the possible cessation of South Sudan, due in January.

At a time of continuing fear of attacks, reports have shown that voters are likely to be swayed by the government – be it the semi-autonomous administration in the south or the Khartoum-based government of national unity – best placed to bring the LRA threat to an end.

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Ugandan bishops tell US leaders military option won't work against rebels
From Catholic News Service (www.catholicnews.com) by Barb Fraze
Wednesday, 15 September 2010

Photo: Ugandan Archbishop John Baptist Odama of Gulu gestures during an interview with Catholic News Service. Looking on is retired Ugandan Anglican Bishop Macleord Baker Ochola II. (CNS photo/Bob Roller)

WASHINGTON (CNS) - Two Ugandan bishops -- one Catholic and one Anglican -- traveled across Africa and the Atlantic to tell U.S. officials that regional dialogue with the Lord's Resistance Army would work better than a military option against it.

"The issue is no longer the LRA and Uganda," said Archbishop John Baptist Odama of Gulu. "The issue now is regional."

Archbishop Odama has headed the Gulu Archdiocese in northern Uganda since 1999 and, during that time, has worked to end hostilities between the Ugandan military and the rebel Lord's Resistance Army, known for its brutality and especially for kidnapping children to use as soldiers and sex slaves. The LRA, once based in northern Uganda, has spread its operations to Southern Sudan, Congo and the Central African Republic.

The archbishop is president of the Acholi Religious Leaders Peace Initiative, an interfaith organization formed in the late 1990s to respond to the violence in northern Uganda, where the Acholi ethnic group is based. He traveled to Washington with one of the founding members of the organization, Anglican Bishop MacLeord Baker Ochola II, retired bishop of Kitgum.

Both men told Catholic News Service in mid-September that they do not oppose the Lord's Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act, which President Barack Obama signed into law in May, but were urging U.S. officials to end the use of force in dealing with the LRA. The cited numerous occasions on which force did not work against the rebel group.

The bishops met with State Department officials, who have until November to develop a strategy for disarming the LRA. They also met with congressional leaders.

"We are afraid," Archbishop Odama told CNS. He said the LRA currently is involved in a conflict to destabilize Uganda's northern neighbor, Southern Sudan, which is scheduled to vote in January on whether to secede from Sudan.

Congo and the Central African Republic, two countries that border Southern Sudan, also have an interest in its stability, the archbishop said.

"Let us bring (their) leaders together -- the new stakeholders," he said. "We say: peaceful approach."

Bishop Ochola, whose daughter committed suicide in 1987 after being brutally attacked by the LRA, said those opposed to peace -- those who advocate continued fighting -- should also be invited to the dialogue.

He said the Acholi Religious Leaders Peace Initiative leaders have offered to mediate multiple times. In 2008, rebel leaders had begun negotiations when a Ugandan military offensive drove them into neighboring countries.

In early September, religious leaders from areas affected by the Lord's Resistance Army met in Southern Sudan to outline a path to peace. In a statement, the leaders said LRA atrocities gave "no sign whatsoever of being on the decrease."

The leaders said that in Southern Sudan, the LRA was attacking urban centers with "massive abductions, displacements and killings." They said they feared "enemies of peace" would use the LRA to prevent the secession referendum.

Since late 2008, the LRA has killed more than 2,500 civilians in Southern Sudan. About 90,000 Sudanese in Western Equatoria province have been displaced from their homes, and 25,000 refugees from Congo and Central African Republic have sought refuge in the province.

Archbishop Odama and Bishop Ochola said capturing or killing LRA leader Joseph Kony would not necessarily end the conflict, because the situation is so complex and includes splinter groups and tribal conflicts. They said adding to the complexity of the situation was that most LRA soldiers were kidnapped and are serving involuntarily.

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Response to Lord's Resistance Army Is "Haphazard"
From Rome's Zenit News (www.zenit.org)
Wednesday, 15 September 2010

YAMBIO, Sudan, SEPT. 15, 2010 (Zenit.org).- Religious and civic leaders from four nations are calling for negotiation and better coordination of international efforts to bring an end to two plus decades of terror caused by the Lord's Resistance Army.

Bishop Edward Hiiboro Kussala of Tombura-Yambio, in southern Sudan, organized a four-day meeting last week, which brought together some 60 representatives including delegations from Uganda, Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo and Central African Republic. Muslims and non-Catholic Christians were also present.

The 46-year-old bishop leads one of the dioceses most hard-hit by the Lord's Resistance Army. The Sudan Tribune reported that at least seven of his parishes have been badly attacked by the rebel group, which is known for brutality.

Bishop Hiiboro spoke Tuesday with Aid to the Church in Need about a reminder of the LRA threat when eight people were hacked to death by machetes in Yambio just days before the religious leaders' conference got under way in that city. Another 14 were badly wounded.

"The impact of the LRA is terrible," he said. "There are huge numbers of refugees and displaced people trying to escape attack.

“They destroy property, leave children as orphans and, with so many leaving, there are no schools or social services.”

Forgotten

The bishop, who has led the Diocese of Tombura-Yambio for just over two years, contended that "[w]e have been forgotten by our own government, forgotten by the international community and this means the LRA think they can do anything they like."

“Think of the number of people who have fled their homes, the number of people who have lost their lives and the number of people left as orphans," he said. “The whole state [of Western Equatoria] is living in panic -- not just in South Sudan but in the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda. It is just too much.”

Though Bishop Hiiboro said it is not clear who backs the army, it is clear that they are well-sponsored.

"There are people who give them weapons, food and enable them to have telephone communications," the bishop explained. "It is difficult to say who helps them. It is obvious that they receive significant support because they are so very well equipped."

Open door

A final statement with 30 signatories from the conference was released Sept. 10. The religious leaders cautioned against military "solutions," noting the dire effects of past efforts.

“The international community has so far failed to develop a comprehensive plan to deal with the LRA as a regional threat, instead addressing the crisis in a piecemeal and haphazard way in the four different countries,” the report stated.

It called for collaboration from the governments of the four nations terrorized by the LRA, and urged greater international pressure from the European Union, the United States and the United Nations.

Bishop Hiiboro told the Fides agency that he is advocating a political solution, which he just recommended in a meeting with the defense minister of Uganda.

"The LRA leader, [Joseph] Kony, has sent me a letter which was delivered to various other regional and international figures -- including the U.N. secretary-general -- saying that he is willing to enter into peace talks once more," the bishop noted. “Let's not close the door on negotiations."

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Bassole’ to Arrive Khartoum End Month for Advancing Government/Movements Talks From Sudan Vision Daily.com - Wednesday, September 15 @ 00:15:00 UTC by Staff Writer

...Government Spokesman Omer Adam Rahma, affirmed government's preparedness for negotiations, brushing aside the movement's accusations of government's attacks on its forces in cooperation with the LRA, adding that LRA was non existent in Darfur. He said, " Nobody can believe in the existence of the LRA troops there." ...

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LRA wants peace talks resumed
From The New Vision (www.newvision.co.ug) by Henry Mukasa
Monday, 13 September, 2010

THE residual LRA rebels’ delegation to the stalled Juba peace talks has written to the secretary general of the UN, Ban Ki-Moon, appealing for the resumption of negotiations with the Government.

In a September 6 letter, the LRA supporters asked the UN boss to take urgent steps to bring the peace talks back on track.

“The leadership of the LRA peace team makes an appeal to the UN secretary general for urgent action to revisit and once again attend to the peace question in Uganda so as to assist in reviving the stalled ‘Northern Uganda peace process,” a letter signed by Justine Labeja, the acting leader of the rebels peace team, stated.

The Government accused the LRA rebels of not being committed to the peace talks.

The Juba peace talks were the fourth time the Government had attempted to end the brutal northern Uganda war through peaceful means. In all attempts, the LRA leader, Joseph Kony, refused to sign the final peace agreement.

The LRA have fought an atrocious war in the north for nearly two decades, killing, maiming and raping people, and looting and torching homesteads.

During the Juba peace talks, the rebels said they were fighting marginalisation by the Government.

After the collapse of the peace talks in January 2007, the Government launched Operation Lightening Thunder on the LRA bases in the DR Congo. Several rebels were killed, captured or surrendered.

However, the rebel collaborators say the military offensive only spread war to the DRC, southern Sudan and the Central African Republic.

LRA top commanders were indicted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

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Top LRA commander moves to southern Sudan
From Bikyamasr.com
Monday, 13 September 2010

Testimony from former Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) fighters who were recently captured near Yambio in Sudan’s Western Equatoria state indicates that a notorious LRA commander, Dominic Ongwen, recently crossed into Sudan from the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Ongwen, who was indicted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity and war crimes in 2005, is part of the LRA’s top leadership, second or third in command after leader Joseph Kony. BM

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Religious leaders call on UN to curb LRA activities
From Radio Miraya.org
Sunday, 12 September 2010 at 10:13

A rare 3-day meeting of about thirty religious and community leaders as well as local government officials from the Southern Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Central Africa Republic, and Uganda has criticized the "lack of a coordinated and comprehensive strategy" to tackle the Lords Resistance Army (LRA).

This came after the leaders met in Yambio town of the Western Equatoria State. The recommendations of the conference called on the UN to intervene and be deployed as quickly as possible to the region in order to halt the LRA activities.

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Common front against Ugandan rebels urged
From Gulf Times.com
Sunday, 12 September 2010 at 12:14 AM Doha Time

(AFP/Khartoum) Co-ordinated action must be taken to end the long-running brutal campaign by the Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebels, leaders from the four countries affected said yesterday.

A rare three-day meeting of 30 religious and community leaders as well as local government officials from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), south Sudan, the Central African Republic (CAR) and Uganda criticised the “lack of a co-ordinated and comprehensive strategy” to tackle the rebels.

“The LRA is committing atrocities across very remote areas of already unstable nations,” read a joint statement following the meeting in the southern Sudanese town of Yambio, state capital of the badly affected Western Equatoria region.

Better co-ordination is needed, they warned, adding that “LRA atrocities give no sign whatsoever of being on the decrease.”

Tens of thousands of people have been killed in two decades of fighting since LRA chief Joseph Kony took up arms, initially against the Ugandan government.

Long since driven out of Uganda, the guerrillas have carved out a vast region of control in the dense forests of northeast DRC, south Sudan and CAR.

“DRC, Sudan and CAR all have internal conflicts that prevent them from sufficiently allocating their forces in a fight against the rebel group,” it added, calling on all national armies to work to boost troop deployment in affected areas.

“The international community has so far failed to develop a comprehensive plan to deal with the LRA as a regional threat, instead addressing the crisis in a piecemeal and haphazard way in the four different countries,” it added.

The signatories demanded that UN peacekeepers be given a “greater capacity to deploy quickly” in response to attacks.

However, the leaders praised the Washington administration for passing a law in May, which commits it to develop a strategy by the end of November to end the rebel campaign of carnage.

The LRA’s acts of startling brutality—including murder, rape, and the forced conscription of children—have forced more than 25,000 people to flee their homes in south Sudan alone since January, the UN says.

Many thousands more have been massacred, abducted or forced from their homes in CAR and DRC by the rebels, whose chiefs are wanted by the International Criminal Court.

The leaders yesterday also called for clarification of the Ugandan army’s role, which has led the hunt for LRA leaders across Sudan, DRC and CAR, since it launched a botched offensive following the collapse of peace talks.

The December 2008 Ugandan-led attacks smashed the rebels’ jungle hideouts in northeast DRC, but analysts suggest the LRA was tipped off and most fighters escaped beforehand, launching reprisal raids across a wide area as they fled.

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Uganda's LRA rebels 'must face African joint action'
From AFP by Peter Martell
Saturday, 11 September 2010 at 7:57 am ET

(KHARTOUM) - Coordinated action must be taken to end the long-running brutal campaign by the Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels, leaders from the four countries affected said on Saturday.

A rare three-day meeting of 30 religious and community leaders as well as local government officials from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), south Sudan, the Central African Republic (CAR) and Uganda criticised the "lack of a coordinated and comprehensive strategy" to tackle the rebels.

"The LRA is committing atrocities across very remote areas of already unstable nations," read a joint statement following the meeting in the southern Sudanese town of Yambio, state capital of the badly affected Western Equatoria region.

Better coordination is needed, they warned, adding that "LRA atrocities give no sign whatsoever of being on the decrease."

Tens of thousands of people have been killed in two decades of fighting since LRA chief Joseph Kony took up arms, initially against the Ugandan government.

Long since driven out of Uganda, the guerrillas have carved out a vast region of control in the dense forests of northeast DRC, south Sudan and CAR.

"DRC, Sudan and CAR all have internal conflicts that prevent them from sufficiently allocating their forces in a fight against the rebel group," it added, calling on all national armies to work to boost troop deployment in affected areas.

"The international community has so far failed to develop a comprehensive plan to deal with the LRA as a regional threat, instead addressing the crisis in a piecemeal and haphazard way in the four different countries," it added.

The signatories demanded that UN peacekeepers be given a "greater capacity to deploy quickly" in response to attacks.

However, the leaders praised the Washington administration for passing a law in May, which commits it to develop a strategy by the end of November to end the rebel campaign of carnage.

The LRA's acts of startling brutality -- including murder, rape, and the forced conscription of children -- have forced more than 25,000 people to flee their homes in south Sudan alone since January, the United Nations says.

Many thousands more have been massacred, abducted or forced from their homes in CAR and DRC by the rebels, whose chiefs are wanted by the International Criminal Court.

The leaders on Saturday also called for clarification of the Ugandan army's role, which has led the hunt for LRA leaders across Sudan, DRC and CAR, since it launched a botched offensive following the collapse of peace talks.

The December 2008 Ugandan-led attacks smashed the rebels' jungle hideouts in northeast DRC, but analysts suggest the LRA was tipped off and most fighters escaped beforehand, launching reprisal raids across a wide area as they fled.

The religious leaders on Saturday insisted that the "preferred sustainable solution is a negotiated settlement" of the LRA crisis "after decades of failed military interventions."

Meanwhile, reports suggest that Dominic Ongwen -- the LRA's second or third in command -- has moved from DRC back to south Sudan, according to testimonies of former fighters collected by the Washington-based Enough pressure group.

Ongwen's reported move is "worrying", it said, with south Sudan approaching a historic vote due in January on its potential full independence.

"Sudan is preparing for a very important referendum early next year, and the LRA has a proven record of destabilising entire regions with few soldiers," said the Enough report, released on Wednesday.

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Sudan: North guilty of using LRA rebels to destabilize south?
LRA says it wants a ceasefire with Sudan, Uganda and CAR
From Afrik News.com
Friday, 10 September 2010 by Konye Obaji Ori, Patrick K. Johnsson

Northern Sudan has been accused of employing rebels of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) to unsettle southern Sudan and the Darfur region ahead of the south’s independence referendum scheduled for January 9, 2011. But an official from the LRA, which has embarked on a mass recruitment, has debunked the claims and suggested that they are rather seeking a peace deal with the region.

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Sudan's Darfur rebels say attacked by Ugandan LRA
From Reuters
Friday, 10 September 2010 at 5:44am GMT

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - A Darfur rebel group said on Thursday it was attacked by Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army guerrillas in Sudan's west.

"A group of LRA attacked our forces in Dafak in South Darfur yesterday," Haydar Galucuma Ateem, vice president of the Darfur rebel Liberation and Justice Movement (LJM), told Reuters from Qatar-based peace talks.

South Sudan, which fought decades of civil war against the north, accuses the northern government of arming the LRA to destabilise the semi-autonomous region ahead of a January 9, 2011 referendum which most believe will result in a vote for independence.

Known for their abduction of child soldiers and extreme brutality, the LRA sought refuge in neighbouring south Sudan during the civil war.

Kampala accused Sudan's central government in Khartoum of providing support to the LRA, a charge Khartoum denies.

After a 2005 north-south peace deal, which did not include a separate conflict in the Darfur region of western Sudan, LRA rebels went on the run and south Sudan said some had moved towards Darfur to receive support from Khartoum there.

South Sudan's government says it cut off Khartoum's supply lines to the LRA after the 2005 accord so the Ugandan rebels moved north to Khartoum-controlled territory in Darfur to get resupplied.

Ateem said two small reconnaissance groups of about 20 young LRA rebels carrying light arms shot and killed one LJM soldier before retreating into dense forest in remote South Darfur.

"Their language was one of the ways we knew they were LRA," he said, adding the Ugandan guerrillas in the past year had often crossed the remote and porous border between South Darfur and the Central African Republic.

"They probably have a relationship with the government of Sudan," Ateem said. "Many of the young people in the area say they are arming the LRA -- the LRA first entered South Darfur about a year ago."

The International Criminal Court issued its first arrest warrants for LRA commanders, whose tactics include mutilating their victims by cutting off their lips and ears.

Groups of LRA soldiers also frequently attack south Sudanese villages near the border with the lawless Democratic Republic of Congo, according to the United Nations and south Sudan government.

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LRA Denies Attack on Sudan-Based Rebels
Voice of America News (voanews.com) by Peter Clottey
Thursday, 09 September 2010
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Britain arrests top LRA negotiator Willy Oryem alias Achila
From Uganda Watch.blogspot.com
Thursday, 09 September 2010
A top Kampala official said Mr Oryem alias Achila, in detention at Harmmondsworth Removal Centre since his arrest upon landing at Heathrow Airport in England on 28 August 2010, has never been “classified as a terrorist”. ...
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LRA massacre victims call for help
From The New Vision (www.newvision.co.ug) by Chris Ocowun
Wednesday, 08 September, 2010

Survivors of the 1995 Atyak massacre repairing the monument built for the 250 people who were killed by the LRA

In April 1995, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebels led by Vincent Otti attacked Atyak township in the morning and massacred more than 250 civilians, leaving behind about 80 survivors and 100 orphans.

The survivors have appealed to the President to fund the building of a big multipurpose hall and library in Atyak township in memory of the deceased.

They also requested the Government and other development partners to build a bigger monument with a recreation centre across Ayugi River where the bloodbath occurred.

Jacob Nokrac, the chairman of the Atyak Survivors’ Association, on Tuesday observed that the Government helped the injured and bereaved families of the July 11 bomb blasts in Kampala.

“We appeal to the Government to provide us with livestock for income generation and at least sh5m as a revolving fund for the survivors,” he said.

Nokrac also called for grinding mills to process their produce. He said some survivors had bomb fragments in their bodies and needed to be operated upon.

Nokrac disclosed that the survivors had formed a saving and loan association where each member saves between sh1,000-5,000 every week. He said the orphans needed school fees.

Betty Acan, 31, a survivor, said she could not continue with education because her brother who used to pay her school fees was killed in the massacre.

The Atyak sub-county chairman, John Bosco Ocan, called on the Government to take over the running of Lwani Memorial Community Secondary School which was built by the community in memory of those massacred by the rebels.

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Ex LRA commander Thomas Kwoyelo to face trial in Uganda's War Crimes Court
From Uganda Watch.blogspot.com
Sunday, 08 August 2010

The New Vision, Uganda, Monday, 06 September 2010: A former Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) commander, Thomas Kwoyelo, has been charged and committed to the War Crimes Court to face trial. Kwoyelo, 39, appeared before Buganda Road Court Chief Magistrate Vincent Mugabo, who did not allow him to plead to the charges. He becomes the first suspect to be charged with offences relating to war crimes.

African Union to protest UN report linking Rwanda troops to genocide in DR Congo

2010-09-19T23:39:00.005+01:00

THE African Union is tipped to use the 65th Session of the United Nations General Assembly to force amendments on the report that accuses Rwanda of alleged Genocide in DR Congo.

The session that gets under way on Monday in New York has been rocked by the leaking of the report linking Rwanda troops to genocide in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Full story below.

African Union to protest UN “Genocide” report in New York
Report from Rwanda News Agency by RNA Reporter
Sunday, 19 September 2010; 12:44:

(Kigali) - The African Union is tipped to use the 65th Session of the United Nations General Assembly to force amendments on the report that accuses Rwanda of alleged Genocide in DR Congo.

The session that gets under way on Monday in New York has been rocked by the leaking of the report linking Rwanda troops to genocide in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The UN was left with egg on its face after the contents of the 600-page draft report was leaked, prompting the secretary-general Ban Ki-moon to fly to Rwanda to ease tensions.

Former and current diplomats told the Kenyan newspaper ‘Sunday Nation’ that the African Union will seek changes to the document as a show of solidarity with Rwanda which has become a major player on the continent.

Another former ambassador and now university don, Prof Frank Matanga, says the leak has exposed the UN and left it with no option but to cause the amendments as demanded by Rwanda.

The recognition of Rwanda’s growing importance in African affairs, Prof Kikaya added, should provide a good starting point to mobilise the AU block to demand tighter structures to forestall any future leaks.

“The burden is on Rwanda’s diplomatic corps to lobby the African caucus to give its position on this matter,” he told the Kenyan daily.

Rwanda’s growing importance in the continent since the genocide in 1994 can be seen in its peace efforts in the region.

It currently has 3300 peacekeeping force and 86 police serving with a joint UN and African Union force (Unamid) in the troubled western Sudanese region of Darfur. It is led by Rwandan Lt Gen Patrick Nyamyumba.

Another 256 troops serve with the UN Mission in Sudan (Unmis), which is supporting the implementation of a peace deal between north and south.

“Rwanda was the first country to send troops to a very treacherous place to monitor implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement. It therefore pioneered the African-based force,” Prof Kikaya pointed out.

Instead of bashing Rwanda, the UN should be thanking the country for evolving African-based peace keeping in the continent, added Prof Kikaya.

The fact that the report also names Uganda, Zimbabwe, Angola and Burundi, it creates sympathy among other African leaders to fall behind their colleagues, according to diplomats.

President Kagame will also meet with UN Secretary General Ban ki-moon and other top UN officials as part of Rwanda’s offensive against the report due to be released on October 01.

Shocking video of Ugandan terror group Lord's Resistance Army hunting children in Sudan

2010-09-08T20:08:00.010+01:00

ONE of the world's most brutal terrorist groups, Joseph Kony's Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), is on the move from the Congo, terrorising civilians.

The below copied report from TIME.com, Tuesday, 07 September 2010, contains a shocking video entitled "The Lord's Resistance Army Hunts Children in Sudan".

Click here (and wait for end of short advert) to view video and hear Ed Robbins reporting for TIME.com from Western Equatoria State, southern Sudan.

Please replay the video and listen carefully to a message for everyone. The message is from a deeply traumatised Sudanese boy. The boy's name is Moses. Moses was abducted, attacked, hurt all over and stabbed with a bayonet by LRA terrorists. The terrorists forced Moses to kill a young girl. The girl was aged 7 or 8. If he did not kill the girl, they would kill him. The heart wrenching message from Moses says:

"I'M ASKING EVERYONE PLEASE, PRAY TO MAKE IT END"

Replay the video again and imagine yourself as Moses. The flat deadened tone of his voice is haunting. After viewing the report for the first time yesterday and working on it today at Sudan Watch, Uganda Watch and Congo Watch, I can't get Moses out of my mind. His trauma seeped into my bones as I imagined how he must have felt, what his future holds, and how he will think and be haunted for the rest of his life. I find this report deeply distressing and disturbing. I cannot understand why so many people are powerless when it comes to stopping the LRA. How someone like Joseph Kony manages to stay alive is beyond my comprehension. The stresses and strains he has gone through in his lifetime are unimaginable. A living hell, I guess.

See further devastating reports and photos here below.
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Balancing Counterterrorism and Democracy in Uganda
TIME.com - Tuesday, 07 September 2010
By Ioannis Gatsiounis in Kampala, Uganda

Photo: Mourners bury Alice Kyalimpa, a victim of the July 11, 2010, terrorist attacks that tore through a restaurant and rugby club in Uganda's capital Ronald Kabuubi/Reuters. Source: Time.com report September 07, 2010 "Balancing Counterterrorism and Democracy in Uganda". To view the full report, click on the link above or visit TIME.com. If the report has moved, view a copy filed on 08 September 2010 at Uganda Watch, a sister blog of Congo Watch.

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LRA KILL 8 IN YAMBIO, W. EQUATORIA, S. SUDAN -
More Ugandan PDF forces to be deployed

WES Yambio: LRA Raid And Kill 8 citizens
Report from South Sudan Analysis (SOSA) online - Monday, 06 September 2010:

(YAMBIO) – Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebels have killed 8 people during weekend raids in Southern Sudan’s Western Equatoria state, a local official said.

Around 6 LRA fighters attacked the market village of Rii-Bodo on Saturday, killing 8 civilians, said Lexon Amozai, State Director of Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Commission in Western Equatoria State.

The horrifying murders come in the wake of an LRA ambush at a near-by small stream of Nahua.

On Friday the rebels launched a similar assault on the village of Gangura.

“They killed 8 people there, among them two women. There were no soldiers deployed there, so they attacked the civilians,” Mr Amozai said.

A Uganda-led coalition including Congo and South Sudan launched a joint offensive against LRA strongholds in Congo’s isolated Garamba National Park on December 14 after LRA leader Joseph Kony again failed to sign a deal to end his rebellion. However, the operation has failed to arrest Joseph Kony.

In the same weekend related attacks were carried on Sunday at James Diko and Naakiri Bomas under Bangasu payam during a final funeral of one of the LRA Victims.

Kony is wanted by the International Criminal Court in The Hague for war crimes.

Bangasi Joseph Bakosoro, state governor of Western Equatoria state with deeply sorrow and regrets expressed his dissatisfaction for the death of 8 WES citizens of Rii-Bodo on Saturday.

In a press statement, Col Bangasi said that, “it is painful to see such barbaric killings by the notorious LRA fighters on the innocent citizens of western Equatoria more especially as referendum gets around the corner.”

He called upon all the youth to stand up in order to provide security to the state from the marauding LRA and the state Government in collaboration with the UPDF and SPLA.

Security sources say soon the state government “will deploy forces around the payams and Bomas.”

Bakosoro assured the citizens that, “more forces of the Ugandan People Defense (UPDF) forces will be deployed around the most attacked areas of the Bomas.”

He cautioned the forestry department to ensure that “all timber cutters are removed from the forest of the state because it makes no sense for the LRA to be killing people leaving them (timber companies) unharmed hence some might be spices of the LRA.”

Meanwhile the Minister of Local Government and Law Enforcement Agencies Colonel Wilson Sidigi said that he will ensure that support is given to the villagers’ security.

Sidigi promised that he will organize with the County Commissioners of Yambio and Nzara to encouraged the youth to stand firm as the security of the State is in the hands of every citizen of the state.

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LRA Kill Eight In Yambio
Report from SRS - Sudan Radio Service - Tuesday, 07 September 2010:

(YAMBIO) – About eight people were killed in attacks allegedly perpetrated by the Lord’s Resistance Army over the weekend in outskirts of Yambio town.

The Western Equatoria state Minister of Information and Communication, Gibson Bullen Wande, spoke to SRS from Yambio on Tuesday.

[Gibson Bullen Wande]: “The LRA appeared between Gangura and a place called Baite, attacked the village and killed three people, so now we are seeing how we are going to handle it. Then on Saturday in the evening, the LRA appeared about 7 kilometers away from Yambio town in a place called Riibodoo. They came into the house of a chief with his in-laws. All of them were beaten to death and one person was abducted. So the total number of people that we have established to have been killed during the two attacks of last week has now come to eight so far.”

Gibson Bullen Wande was speaking to SRS from Yambio on Tuesday.

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LRA rebels kill eight in South Sudan raid, local official says
Report from Sudan Tribune online - Tuesday, 07 September 2010
By Richard Ruati - excerpt:

(YAMBIO - September 06, 2010) - The Ugandan rebels Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) has killed eight people in raids over the weekend in South Sudan’s state of Western Equatoria, a local official has said.

The LRA, which is a sectarian religious and military group from northern Uganda, has a history of committing atrocities in the region.

It began as an Acholi tribe rebel movement seeking to overthrow the Ugandan Government. What it stands for now is a matter of debate but in 2005 the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued its first five arrest warrants for LRA leader, Joseph Kony, his deputy and three of his commanders.

Around six LRA fighters attacked the market village of Rii-Bodo at about 2:00 am (local time) on Saturday, 4 August, and killed civilians, said Lexon Amozai who is the state director of the Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Commission in Western Equatoria State. The murders took place after an LRA ambush at the nearby Nahua stream.

On Friday, the rebels launched a similar assault on the village of Gangura. "They killed eight people there, among them two women. There were no soldiers deployed there, so they attacked the civilians," Amozai said.

A Uganda-led coalition including Congo and South Sudan launched a joint offensive against the LRA strongholds in Congo’s isolated Garamba National Park on December 14, after LRA leader Kony again failed to sign a peace deal. However, the operation has failed to arrest Kony.

On Sunday, August 5, related attacks were carried out in James Diko, Naakiri Bomas and during the funeral of one of the LRA victims in Bangasu. [...]

Security sources say that the state government’s deployment of "forces around the payams [villages] and Bomas,” is imminent.

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"I'M ASKING EVERYONE PLEASE, PRAY TO MAKE IT END"

Photo: Gulu victim. The LRA use torture to instil fear. Uganda's rebel LRA has become synonymous with torture, abductions and killings. (BBC photo/Sudan Watch archive)

Photo: Two young boy's get treated for severe burn wounds in the Lira hospital in northern Uganda, 23 February 2004, after a massacre believed to be committed by the LRA in the Barlonyo camp 26 kilometers north of the town that killed at least 200 people. (AP Photo/Karel Prinsloo/Sudan Watch archive)

Photo: Ochola John was deformed by rebels from the LRA. (BBC) Click here to read the victim's heartbreaking testimony published at BBC News online on 29 June 2006. If the report has moved, click here to read a copy filed on 30 June 2006 at Uganda Watch, a sister site of this blog Sudan Watch.

Photo: Leader of the LRA peace delegation Martin Ojul, left, is welcomed back home at Koch Goma in Amuru. (AP Photo) Source: Report from TIME.com - Saturday, 10 November 2007, by Alexis Okeowo in Gulu. Excerpt:

Sixteen years ago, Irene Abonyo was held down to the ground and her lips and ears viciously sliced off by rebels in northern Uganda. But 70-year old Abonyo is in a forgiving mood. She attended a steamy, overcrowded town-hall meeting to see, on better terms this time, one of the world's most terrifying rebel groups, the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA). After a dialogue, she went over to shake the hand of a former LRA fighter. He held her hand, but refused to have his picture taken with the disfigured woman. "I will still forgive," Abonyo explains. "They are embarrassed of what they have done." Full story by Alexis Okeowo (Gulu, N. Uganda) published at TIME.com on Saturday, 10 November 2007: "Forgiving the Lord's Resistance Army"

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"I'M ASKING EVERYONE PLEASE, PRAY TO MAKE IT END"

Last month, Human Rights Watch said the LRA had killed more than 250 people in the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo over the previous year and a half. It said nearly 700 others were kidnapped and forced to be either soldiers or sex slaves. Full story at Voice of America News (VOA) online, Tuesday, 07 September 2010: "LRA Kills 8 in Southern Sudan".

Photo: Southern Sudanese wait for food, shelter, security and medicine at the village of Nzara, along Sudan's border with the Democratic Republic of Congo, on 18 August 2010. Thousands have fled their nearby villages since a recent series of attacks by guerrilla fighters believed to be from the Lord's Resistance Army. (Peter Martell/AFP/Getty Images) Full story by Alan Boswell (Nzara, South Sudan) published at TIME.com on Tuesday, 31 August 2010: "The Ruthless Guerrilla Movement That Won't Die".
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Balancing Counterterrorism and Democracy in Uganda
Report from TIME.com
By Ioannis Gatsiounis in Kampala, Uganda
Tuesday, 07 September 2010. Full copy:

U.S. President Barack Obama took office promising to make good governance the cornerstone of his African policy, and Uganda came to typify the shift in priorities. Repeated attempts by President Yoweri Museveni to meet with Obama were denied, apparently in response to Uganda's sluggish pace of political reform ahead of presidential elections in February. President Obama also directly challenged Museveni to lift his support for a draconian bill persecuting gays.

But just as the 9/11 attacks drew the U.S. closer to autocratic Arab regimes whose security services were needed to help fight al-Qaeda, so have the July 11 bombings of two Kampala nightspots by the Somalia-based al-Shabab militant group reminded the Obama Administration of Uganda's importance in the battle against extremism in the Horn of Africa. And that strategic interdependency challenges the U.S. democracy agenda. (See a video of the Lord's Resistance Army hunting children in Sudan.)

"Washington is now forced to do a balancing act," says Livingstone Sweanyana, executive director at the Foundation for Human Rights Initiative in Kampala. "If the U.S. is going to work with Museveni on al-Shabab, the U.S. can't afford to see or treat him as an unfriendly force."

U.S. officials insist that democratic reform still figures at the top of Washington's agenda in Uganda. But as Museveni's National Resistance Movement (NRM) has used the July 11 terror attacks as a pretext to shrink the political space, Washington's critique hasn't kept pace. Three days after the bombings, parliament passed a bill enabling phone-tapping. Weeks later, nationwide demonstrations demanding an independent election commission were violently suppressed on grounds that they could be exploited by terrorists. And the media have since been banned from commenting on the twin bombings. (Can Uganda forgive the Lord's Resistance Army?)

Following the crackdown on protests calling for an election commission, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Johnnie Carson did say that security concerns were no justification for squelching dissent. Curiously, however, the previous day he told a reporter on the sidelines of an African Union (A.U.) summit in Kampala that Museveni had been "elected openly and transparently in free and fair elections," contradicting a 2006 State Department assessment that the polls had been "marred by serious irregularities." (See pictures of Uganda.)

The about-face may be driven by growing desperation. At the same A.U. summit, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said that "ending the threat of al-Shabab to the world will take more than just law enforcement" and that Washington was therefore going to work closely "to support the African Union's [military] mission in Somalia [AMISOM]." Washington is looking to boost current troop levels from 8,000 — most of them from Burundi and Uganda — to 20,000. The problem is that few member states other than Uganda have volunteered to step up. Museveni, a former rebel leader, is reportedly prepared to mobilize that many troops on his own and has been leading calls to switch AMISOM's mandate from peacekeeping to peace enforcement.

"The U.S. is depending on Uganda to play a role in Somalia to rein in extremist forces," says James Tumusiime, managing editor of the opposition-leaning Observer weekly. "And in light of the attacks, the U.S. is probably beginning to think they're better off with a stable, functioning style of leadership in Uganda — someone who's not necessarily a democrat but a guy in control — rather than support change for democracy's sake."

U.S. diplomats in Kampala say much of their democracy-promotion work is low-key. One example is their success in persuading Uganda to put voter-registration lists online to allow the validation of voter identities. USAID invested around $2 million on democracy and governance programs last year, and that figure is expected to hit $10 million this year. Officials argue that security and democracy are mutually reinforcing.

But support for the key opposition demand of an independent election commission appears to be waning, says Wafula Oguttu, spokesperson for the leading opposition party Forum for Democratic Change (FDC). Recalling Washington's silence after the recent suppression of demonstrations — in which 80 people were arrested and some claimed to have been tortured — Oguttu says, "The U.S. likely would have spoken out against that prior to al-Shabab." Now the opposition is anxiously awaiting U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's quarterly report on Uganda, due late this month, after Congress ordered the State Department to tightly monitor Uganda's election process. "A lot of bad things have happened since May," says Oguttu, and he expects the report to reflect that fact.

The last such report, issued in May, irritated NRM leaders, but prompted no constructive action. Indeed the party's primary polls on Monday were marred by confusion and allegations of ballot-stuffing. Opposition groups hope that Washington will use its leverage as one of Uganda's leading aid donors to press for change. But they fear the U.S. lacks the resolve to press the issue, leaving Uganda's election process heavily skewed toward the ruling party.

Challenges to the legitimacy of the electoral process raise the danger of large-scale political violence, analysts warn. Last September, riots in Kampala left 17 people dead after the king of Buganda kingdom was prevented by Museveni from visiting a nearby district. (Comment on this story.)

"We have shown restraint so far," says the FDC's Oguttu. But if the mechanisms for free and fair elections fail to materialize, he says, "we're going to have a little bit of trouble." He predicts the youth will grow more vocal and could target the destruction of election-commission offices. Meanwhile, the opposition is mulling the option of boycotting February's elections. Whatever the case may be, he says, "expect fireworks." And a new round of political turmoil, of course, is unlikely to help promote either democracy or security.

Find this article at:
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2016175,00.html

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Congo Watch Editor's Note: A similar version of the above was published earlier today (Wednesday, 08 September 2010) at this blog's parent site, Sudan Watch http://sudanwatch.blogspot.com and cross-posted today at sister site Uganda Watch http://ugandawatch.blogspot.com.

UN's DR Congo “Mapping Report” to be released October 1st - UN chief urges Rwanda over Sudan peacekeepers

2010-09-02T15:37:00.013+01:00

Photo: Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir shakes hands with Rwandan UNAMID Commander Lieutenant General Patrick Nyamvumba on arrival at the El Fasher International Airport, north Darfur, February 24, 2010. (Photo: Reuters/via RNA News)

(AGENCIES) - UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged Rwanda Thursday not to withdraw peacekeepers from Sudan, as it has threatened because of war crimes claims, and highlighted their role in regional stability.

A Rwandan army spokesman said Tuesday the country would withdraw about 3,500 peacekeepers from Sudan if the UN publishes a report on war crimes allegedly committed by Kigali in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Noting Rwanda's contribution to two UN peacekeeping missions in Sudan, Ban told journalists in Vienna: "I hope that this contribution will continue for the peace and security of the region."

"Peace and security in Darfur and Sudan has very big implications for peace in the wider region," he added.

The UN draft report alleges that Rwandan Tutsi troops and their rebel allies targeted, chased, hacked, shot and burned Hutus in the DR Congo, from 1996 to 1997, after the outbreak of a cross-border Central African war.

The army spokesman, Lieutenant-Colonel Jill Rutaremara, said in a statement that if the report is published, the Rwandan Defence Force has a plan in place to withdraw its peacekeepers from Sudan.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay announced Thursday that the report of the Mapping Exercise documenting the most serious human rights violations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) between 1993 and 2003 will be made public on 1 October 2010.

“Following requests, we have decided to give concerned states a further month to comment on the draft,” Pillay said, “and I have offered to publish any such comments alongside the report itself on 1 October, if they so wish.”

According to the report, the Rwandan army and associated Congolese rebel groups systematically targeted members of the Hutu tribe in DR Congo.

The actions of the Rwandan army in seeking revenge on Hutus in DR Congo could be defined as genocide, the report said.

Sources: See reports below.

UN chief urges Rwanda over Sudan peacekeepers
AFP - Thursday, 02 September 2010

UN delays release of controversial report on Congo massacres
Deutsche Presse Agentur - Thursday, 02 September 2010, 15:29 GMT

(Geneva) - The release of a United Nations report detailing the massacre of thousands of civilians by Rwandan and Congolese forces in the Democratic Republic of Congo has been delayed by a month, UN human rights chief Navi Pillay said Thursday.

The draft report, leaked to the media last week, outraged Rwanda and led to the East African nation threatening to pull its troops from UN peacekeeping missions, starting with Sudan's Darfur province.

'Following requests, we have decided to give concerned states a further month to comment on the draft,' Pillay said, 'and I have offered to publish any such comments alongside the report itself on 1 October, if they so wish.'

The report details hundreds of incidents and the killings of tens of thousand of non-combatants, including women and children, in the Democratic Republic of Congo between 1993 and 2003.

According to the report, the Rwandan army and associated Congolese rebel groups systematically targeted members of the Hutu tribe in DR Congo.

Hutu militia slaughtered 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus during Rwanda's 1994 genocide, which was ended by invading Tutsi forces led by Paul Kagame, who is now president of the Central African nation. Around 1 million Hutus fled to DR Congo as the Tutsi army bore down on Kigali.

The actions of the Rwandan army in seeking revenge on Hutus in DR Congo could be defined as genocide, the report said.

There were rumours that UN head Ban Ki-moon pressured Pillay to remove the word 'genocide' from the text. However, Pillay's spokesman said Ki-moon had not made any attempt to have the text altered.

Foreign Minister Louise Mushikiwabo told reporters in Kigali earlier this week that Rwandan soldiers in Darfur, numbering almost 3,500, had been put on standby for withdrawal in advance of the report's publication.

The genocide is still a sensitive subject in Rwanda. Opponents of Kagame have been arrested on charges of 'genocide ideology' for suggesting invading Tutsi forces massacred Hutu civilians.

Kagame recently won a landslide re-election.

DR Congo is still recovering from a full-scale conflict that ran from 1998-2003. An estimated 5.4 million people have died as a result of the conflict and its long aftermath.

UN Delays Congo 'Genocide' Report
Voice of America News - Thursday, 02 September 2010
Rwanda said Tuesday it is ready to withdraw its peacekeeping troops from Sudan if the UN published what it called the "outrageous and damaging report.

Rwanda asked for response on UN “Genocide” report
RNA News - Thursday, 02 September 2010 16:12 by RNA Reporters
Kigali: The controversial UN report which Rwanda has severely contested as it claims its forces massacred civilians in DR Congo over a 10-year period will be released in October with comments from the named countries, its authors said Thursday.

UN human rights chief announces release date for DR Congo “Mapping Report”
United Nations – Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
GENEVA, Switzerland, September 2, 2010/African Press Organization (APO)

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay announced Thursday that the report of the Mapping Exercise documenting the most serious human rights violations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) between 1993 and 2003 will be made public on 1 October 2010.

“Following requests, we have decided to give concerned states a further month to comment on the draft,” Pillay said, “and I have offered to publish any such comments alongside the report itself on 1 October, if they so wish.”

The mapping exercise and its resulting report are unprecedented in scope, covering ten years and the entire territory of the DRC, not just the war-torn east. The report describes a total of more than 600 incidents in the DRC between 1993 and 2003 in which tens of thousands of people were killed. Most of these attacks were directed against non-combatant civilian populations consisting primarily of women and children. Over 1,280 witnesses were interviewed to corroborate or invalidate alleged violations, including previously undocumented incidents, and more than 1,500 documents were collected and analysed during the two years that it took to research and write the report.

The overarching objective of the DRC Mapping Exercise is “to formulate a series of options aimed at assisting the Government of the DRC in identifying appropriate transitional justice mechanisms to deal with the legacy of these violations, in terms of truth, justice, reparation and reform.”

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U.S. HELPS TO BRING CONGO REBELS TO JUSTICE

US helps to bring Congo rebels to justice, Hillary says
Report from Miraya FM - Thursday, 26 August 2010 11:05

The United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that the US will help any effort to bring to justice rebels accused in the mass rape of women and children in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Rebels from the Mai Mai militia and Rwandan Hutu FDLR, who occupied the town of Luvungi in North Kivu province from July 30 to Aug. 3, raped and assaulted at least 154 civilians, according to UN figures.

The UN adopted a resolution last year recognizing the importance of preventing and responding to sexual violence as a tactic of war against civilians. However, Clinton said it was now time for member nations to go beyond that with specific steps to protect civilians against sexual violence and prosecute those who commit such atrocities. The UN has a peacekeeping force of nearly 20,000 members in Congo. A UN spokesman said the peacekeeping force only heard about the incident in the eastern province more than a week after it happened. The world body said Secretary General Ban Ki-moon was outraged by the attacks and dispatched a top official to Congo on Tuesday. The UN did not spell out the precise mandate of the mission.

Rwanda: Plan ready to withdraw peacekeepers from Sudan

2010-09-01T15:06:00.007+01:00

Report from SRS - Sudan Radio Service - Wednesday, 01 September 2010
Rwanda To Pull Out Peacekeeping Troops From Sudan

01 September 2010 - (Darfur) – The Rwandan government announced on Tuesday that it is threatening to withdraw its peacekeeping troops in Darfur and southern Sudan.

The move follows UN accusations that the Rwandan forces were involved in the inter-ethnic killing in the Democratic Republic of Congo in the 1990s.

A diplomatic source told SRS on Wednesday that the withdrawal of Rwandan troops, one of the top contributing countries to the UNAMID force, will make UNAMID’s mandate quite difficult in Darfur.

However, the governor of southern Darfur, Doctor Abdulhamid Musa Kasha, said that Sudanese forces are controlling the security situation in Darfur. He said there was no need for UNAMID peacekeeping troops in the region.

Kasha spoke to SRS from Nyala on Wednesday.

[Abdulhamid Musa Kasha]: “We welcome the presence of the Rwandan peacekeeping forces, but for Rwanda to withdraw its troops from the UNAMID - that is something that does not concern the Sudan government. We are controlling the security situation in Darfur ourselves. Even the kidnapping of foreigners in Darfur that you are hearing, are being caused because of errors made by UNAMID.”

Rwanda has 3,556 personnel serving in UNAMID and UNMIS, the UN mission in Sudan.

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Report from Associated Press - Wednesday, 01 September 2010
Rwanda: Plan ready to withdraw peacekeeping troops

KIGALI, Rwanda - Rwanda says it is ready to withdraw its U.N. peacekeepers from Sudan if the U.N. publishes a report accusing Rwanda's army of possible genocide in the 1990s.

Rwanda Defence Force spokesman Lt. Col. Jill Rutaremara said Tuesday that the country has finalized a contingency withdrawal plan from Darfur and Southern Sudan if the U.N. publishes its "outrageous and damaging report."

A draft of the report leaked last week accuses Rwandan troops and allies tied to Congo's current president of slaughtering tens of thousands of Hutus in Congo. The alleged attacks came two years after those troops stopped Rwanda's 1994 genocide that killed more than 500,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus.

Rwanda has described the report as "fatally flawed."

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RWANDAN OFFICIAL CRITICAL OF AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

Photo: Rwandan president Paul Kagame holds a press conference in Kigali, Rwanda, as citizens vote for president Monday for the second time since the country's 1994 genocide, 9 Aug 2010. (AP).

Source: VOA News report by Peter Clottey, 31 August 2010 - Rwanda Official Critical of Amnesty Law Review Appeal - excerpt:

"... the justice minister said the government has reassured Amnesty it will be taking into consideration its concerns when reviewing the laws to improve them.

“What Amnesty International has not told the world, which is really very unfortunate, is that I gave them three assignments to do for us. One [was] to check for us how this legislation is written in other European countries where hate legislation is in place. They have not responded to that. Then, I ask them also to do research for us on how our courts have interpreted it. They have not done that,” he said.

Officials of Amnesty International were not immediately available for comment despite repeated attempts."

UN has accused Rwanda of wholesale war crimes, including possibly genocide, during years of conflict in the DR Congo

2010-08-26T23:27:00.017+01:00

ACCORDING to an alleged UN report leaked by France's Le Monde newspaper, an unprecedented investigation investigation by the UN human rights commissioner says Hutu deaths 'cannot be put down to margins of war'.

Reportedly, the Rwandan government reacted angrily to the report today, dismissing it as "amateurish" and "outrageous" after attempting to pressure the UN not to publish it by threatening to pull out of international peacekeeping missions.

See report from guardian.co.uk
By Chris McGreal in Washington, Xan Rice in Nairobi, and Lizzy Davies in Paris - Thursday 26 August 2010 20.45 BST:
Leaked UN report accuses Rwanda of possible genocide in Congo

The United Nations has accused Rwanda of wholesale war crimes, including possibly genocide, during years of conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

An unprecedented 600-page investigation by the UN high commissioner for human rights catalogues years of murder, rape and looting in a conflict in which hundreds of thousands were slaughtered.

A draft version of the report, revealed by Le Monde and expected to be published next month, says the abuses, over a period of seven years and two invasions by Rwanda, amount to "crimes against humanity, war crimes, or even genocide" because the principal targets of the violence were Hutus, who were killed in their tens of thousands.

Among the accusations is that Rwandan forces and local allies rounded up hundreds of men, women and children at a time and butchered them with hoes and axes. On other occasions Hutu refugees were bayoneted, burned alive or killed with hammer blows in large numbers.

It is the first time the UN has published such forthright allegations against Rwanda, a close ally of Britain and the US.

The Rwandan government reacted angrily to the report today, dismissing it as "amateurish" and "outrageous" after reportedly attempting to pressure the UN not to publish it by threatening to pull out of international peacekeeping missions.

Rwanda's Tutsi leaders will be particularly discomforted by the accusation of genocide when they have long claimed the moral high ground for bringing to an end the 1994 genocide in their own country. But the report was welcomed by human rights groups, which called for the prosecution of those responsible for war crimes.

The report covers two periods: Rwanda's 1996 invasion of the country then called Zaire in pursuit of Hutu soldiers and others who fled there after carrying out the 1994 genocide of hundreds of thousands of Tutsis, and a second invasion two years later that broadened into a regional war involving eight countries.

Rwanda's attack on Zaire in 1996 was initially aimed at clearing the vast UN refugee camps around Goma and Bukavu, which were being used as cover by Hutu armed forces to continue the war against the new Tutsi-led government in Kigali.

Hundreds of thousands of the more than 1 million Hutus in eastern Zaire were forced back to Rwanda. Many more, including men who carried out the genocide but also large numbers of women and children, fled deeper into Zaire. They were pursued and attacked by the Rwandan army and a Zairean rebel group sponsored by Kigali, the AFDL.

The UN report describes "the systematic, methodical and premeditated nature of the attacks on the Hutus [which] took place in all areas where the refugees had been tracked down".

"The pursuit lasted months and, occasionally, humanitarian aid intended for them was deliberately blocked, notably in the eastern province, thus depriving them of things essential to their survival," the report said.

"The extent of the crimes and the large number of victims, probably in the several tens of thousands, are demonstrated by the numerous incidents detailed in the report. The extensive use of non-firearms, particularly hammers, and the systematic massacres of survivors after camps were taken prove that the number of deaths cannot be put down to the margins of war. Among the victims were mostly children, women, old and ill people."

The report goes on to say that "the systematic and widespread attacks have a number of damning elements which, if proved before a competent court, could be described as crimes of genocide".

The UN also adds that while Kigali has permitted Hutus to return to Rwanda in large numbers, that did not "rule out the intention of destroying part of an ethnic group as such and thus committing a crime of genocide".

The Zairean army collapsed in the face of the invasion and Rwanda seized the opportunity to march across the country and overthrow the longstanding dictator, Mobutu Sese Seko. Laurent Kabila was installed as president. He promptly changed the name of the country to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Rwanda invaded again in 1998 after accusing the new regime of continuing to support Hutu rebels. The following five years of war drew in armies from eight nations as well as 21 rebel groups in a conflict that quickly descended in to mass plunder of the DRC's minerals as well as a new wave of war crimes.

The UN report accuses Angolan forces of using the cover of the war to attack refugees from Angola's conflict-plagued Cabinda province who had fled to the DRC. Angola is accused of "executing all those they suspected of colluding with their enemies". Angolan soldiers also raped and looted, the UN investigation said.

International human rights groups welcomed the UN report and said it should be used to bring the accused to trial. "This is a very important report," said Human Rights Watch. "We hope that it can form the basis for ending the impunity that has protected the people responsible for some of these crimes."

The UN's damning conclusions will prove hugely embarrassing to Rwanda, which is attempting to project itself as a rapidly modernising state that has put its brutal recent history behind it.

President Paul Kagame's office attempted to dismiss the report. "It's an amateurish NGO job, and it's outrageous," said a spokeswoman, Yolande Makolo. "Nobody reasonable believes that it's helpful to anybody. The countries mentioned in the draft report have rejected it and will continue to reject it."

Makolo did not comment on reports that Kagame last month warned the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, that Rwanda would pull its troops out of peacekeeping missions in Darfur and elsewhere if the report was made public. Le Monde said that threat was reiterated in a letter to Ban by Rwanda's foreign minister, Louise Mushikiwabo.

Rupert Colville, spokesman for the UN high commissioner for human rights, said the leaked draft was not the final version and the report to be published next month had undergone revisions.

"It's only a draft from about two months ago and the proper final version will come up very soon," he said.

But if there are substantial differences, the UN is likely to stand accused of bowing to pressure from Rwanda.

Atrocities detailed in the UNHCR document seen by Le Monde

Kinigi, 7 December 1996 "Elements from the AFDL/APR killed nearly 310 civilians, many of them women and children. The troops had accused the local population, mostly Hutu, of sheltering Interahamwe [Hutu paramilitaries, who] had already left the village. At first the troops sought to reassure the civilians [whom they gathered together] in several buildings, including the adventist church and the primary school. In the afternoon, troops entered these buildings and killed the villagers with hoes or axes to the head."

Luberizi, 29 October 1996 "Elements from the AFDL/APR/FAB [Burundi's armed forces] killed around 200 male refugees. The victims were part of a group of refugees told by the troops to regroup so that they could be repatriated to Rwanda. The troops separated the men from the rest of the group and killed them with bayonets or bullets. The bodies were then buried in mass graves [near to] the church."

Bwegera, 3 November 1996 "They burned alive 72 Rwandan refugees in Cotonco (cotton company) headquarters, one kilometre from the village."

Mutiko, December 1996 "Special units from the AFDL/APR started to hunt down refugees, killing several hundred. Once they had been intercepted at barriers put up by the troops, the victims were given food and told to get into UN lorries waiting at the exit of the village. The victims were then taken out on to the road, then killed with blows to the head with canes, hammers and axes. The troops encouraged the local population to take part in the killings."

UN chief calls for investigation into attack by Mai-Mai and FDLR in North Kivu, eastern DR Congo

2010-08-25T23:20:00.010+01:00

Statement attributable to the Spokesperson for the UN Secretary-General on the Democratic Republic of the Congo
From United Nations – Office of the Spokesperson of the Secretary-General - Wednesday, 25 August 2010/via APO:

(NEW YORK) - The Secretary-General is outraged by the rape and assault of at least 154 Congolese civilians, during an attack by armed elements of the Mai-Mai and the Forces démocratiques de libération du Rwanda (FDLR), in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). This is another grave example of both the level of sexual violence and the insecurity that continue to plague the DRC.

The Secretary-General reiterates his call on all armed groups in the DRC to lay down their weapons and join the peace process. The Secretary-General further calls on the authorities of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to investigate this incident and bring to justice the perpetrators of these crimes and renew efforts to bring an end to insecurity in the eastern part of the country.

The United Nations supports the efforts of the Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to fight impunity and ensure the protection of civilians from violations of international human rights and humanitarian law, including all forms of sexual and gender-based violence.

Given the seriousness of the incident, the Secretary-General has decided to dispatch immediately Assistant Secretary-General Atul Khare, Officer-in-Charge of the United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations to the DRC. He has also instructed his Special Representative for Sexual Violence in Conflict, Margot Wallström, to take charge of the UN’s response and follow-up to this incident.`
- - -

RDC : rapports de violences sexuelles au Nord Kivu, à l’Est de la République démocratique du Congo
NEW YORK, 25 août 2010/African Press Organization (APO)/ — Déclaration du Secrétaire général des Nations Unies.

Le Secrétaire général est indigné par les viols et les agressions sexuelles dont ont été victimes au moins 154 civils congolais lors d’une attaque par des éléments armés Mai-Mai et les Forces démocratiques de libération du Rwanda (FDLR) à l’est de la République démocratique du Congo (RDC). Ces graves incidents illustrent à nouveau le niveau de violence sexuelle ainsi que l’insécurité qui continuent d’affecter la RDC.

Le Secrétaire général réitère son appel à la démobilisation des groupes armés en RDC et leur adhésion au processus de paix en cours. Le Secrétaire général appelle aussi les autorités congolaises à mener une enquête sur ces incidents, à poursuivre en justice les auteurs de ces crimes, et à renouveler leurs efforts pour mettre fin à l’insécurité qui sévit dans cette partie du pays.

Les Nations Unies soutiennent les efforts du Gouvernement de la RDC visant à lutter contre l’impunité et à protéger les civils contre les violations du droit international humanitaire et des droits de l’homme, notamment toutes les formes de violence sexuelle.

Étant donné la gravité de cet incident, le Secrétaire général a décidé de dépêcher immédiatement le Sous-secrétaire général aux opérations de maintien de la paix, Atul Khare, en RDC. Il a également demandé à sa Représentante spéciale pour la violence sexuelle dans les conflits, Margot Wallström, de diriger les initiatives des Nations Unies en réponse à cet incident ainsi que d’en assurer le suivi.

Click on labels here below to view reports in the archives of Congo Watch.

ICC releases Congolese warlord Thomas Lubanga Dyilo

2010-07-17T16:35:00.003+01:00

Last week, ICC proceedings against Lubanga were suspended after the defence complained that prosecution led by Argentinean lawyer Luis Moreno-Ocampo was not disclosing information by not identifying a key witness.

The ICC trial chamber judges said on Thursday that Lubanga "an accused cannot be held in preventative custody on a speculative basis, namely that at some stage in the future the proceedings may be resurrected".

The Prosecutor has failed to implement two of the Chamber's orders; those of July seven. For the reasons set out in the decision imposing the stay, this constituted a deliberate and in our judgement, wholly unjustified refusal to comply with the directions of the Court", Judge Fulford said.

From Hindustan Times
ICC releases Congolese warlord
Press Trust Of India
First Published: 11:44 IST(16/7/2010)
Last Updated: 11:49 IST(16/7/2010)

(United Nations - 16 July 16, 2010) - The International Criminal Court (ICC) has ordered the release of Congolese warlord Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, who used child soldiers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo's civil war. Last week, proceedings against Lubanga were suspended after the defense complained that prosecution led by Argentinean lawyer Luis Moreno-Ocampo was not disclosing information by not identifying a key witness.

The ICC trial chamber judges said on Thursday that Lubanga "an accused cannot be held in preventative custody on a speculative basis, namely that at some stage in the future the proceedings may be resurrected".

The Prosecutor has failed to implement two of the Chamber's orders; those of July seven. For the reasons set out in the decision imposing the stay, this constituted a deliberate and in our judgement, wholly unjustified refusal to comply with the directions of the Court", Judge Fulford said.

"It is fair that the issue of sanctions should await the outcome of the appeal," he added.

Lubanga, the former leader of the Union of Congolese Patriots from 1999 to 2003, operated in the Ituri region of the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

He has been charged with war crimes for recruiting and using child soldiers in inter-ethnic conflict in Congo's Ituri Province.

Lubanga, who surrendered in 2006, was the first person to go on trial at the ICC. He has pleaded not guilty.

The hearings, which began in January 2009, have been bogged down by procedural irregularities.

Several witnesses asked for special protection during the trial since the Ituri region is still a dangerous place.

The prosecution has five days to appeal the decision.

The court also noted that before the order releasing Lubanga could be implemented, arrangements would have to be made for his transfer to a country that would receive him.

The ICC is presently dealing with situations in four countries, Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan and the Central African Republic.

In 2009, the ICC issued its first arrest warrant for a sitting head-of-state, Sudanese President Omar-al Bashir, for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Darfur conflict. This week, it added genocide to the charges against Bashir.

In April, the judges of The Hague based ICC, gave Moreno-Ocampo the green signal for investigating the ethnic violence that erupted after the disputed elections in Kenya, two years ago.

CultureGrams seeks writer for text on DR Congo

2010-06-12T06:00:00.003+01:00

YESTERDAY I received the following email. I am copying it here in full incase it is of interest to any readers of Congo Watch. Please note that the email was unsolicited and its author is unknown to me but feel free to pass it on.

Subject: Seeking a writer for text on Dr Congo

Ingrid,

I came across your blog while searching for someone to do a small writing project for me. Below is a form letter that explains in greater detail what I’m looking for. I would appreciate any help you can give me.

I’m an editor of an educational publication called CultureGrams, which is seeking someone with experience in the DR Congo for a paid project. I’m hoping that you might be able to assist me in locating someone.

CultureGrams is a series of more than 200 country-specific reports that describe people's daily life and culture. The audience consists primarily of North American students and educators.

We are currently seeking someone to help us expand our existing DR Congo report. This person will provide additional cultural information about certain sections of the report. We will provide direction and prompts as to the type of information we are seeking. Contributors receive a one-time payment of $250.

No professional writing experience is required. We ask only that contributors be current or recent residents of the country (preferably with at least 2.5 years of full-time residency in the last 4 years), have a college degree (or equivalent education), fluently speak the country's official language or a major national language, and have had experience in more than one region of the country and with people of different socioeconomic levels.

I’d be grateful if you could let me know of anyone who might be interested in this project. Applicants should email me their CV and a brief description of how they meet the above qualifications. More information on CultureGrams is available at www.culturegrams.com.

Thanks in advance for any help you can provide. Perhaps you know someone in DR Congo who would be qualified to do this writing.

Sincerely,

Steve Williams
Editor, ProQuest
5252 North Edgewood Drive, Suite 125
Provo, UT 84604
InformationWeek 500 Top Innovator

Congo Siasa blog: List of armed groups in the Kivus

2010-06-11T08:40:00.013+01:00

TODAY, thanks to Alun McDonald's tweet (see details below), I found Jason Stearns' blog, Congo Siasa at http://congosiasa.blogspot.com and noted his list of armed groups in the Kivus published on 09 June 2010 at his blog post entitled List of armed groups in the Kivus.

According to the 'About' page at Congo Siasa blog, Mr Stearns has been working on the conflict in the DR Congo for the past eight years, most recently as the Coordinator of the United Nations Group of Experts on the Congo (2008). He has also worked for Heritiers de la Justice, a local human rights NGO (2001), the UN peacekeeping mission MONUC (2002-2004) and the International Crisis Group (2005-2007). A book he wrote on the conflict, Dancing in the Glory of Monsters, is due to be published soon. He is currently obtaining his PhD at Yale University.

Hat tip: Alun McDonald's tweet 10 June 2010 - A who’s who of armed groups in eastern Congo http://is.gd/cJOt5.

Note, according to Mr McDonald's bio, he is based in Nairobi, Kenya, "working for Oxfam, covering Sudan, Congo, Somalia and everywhere in between". See alunmcdonald's photostream at Flickr and the photo set on Sudan where he lived between 2006 and 2009. Most of the photos were taken in Darfur, South Sudan, the eastern Red Sea State, Khartoum (the capital), and the northern desert. The photos from Great Lakes: Congo, Uganda, Rwanda were taken from between 04 May 2009 and 30 June 2009. Here is a sample.

A hotel in Kiwanja, North Kivu, destroyed in the fighting in late 2008. In November 2008, a massacre in this small town killed 150 people. (Photo and caption by Alun McDonald)

A camp in North KIvu, sheltering thousands of people who fled the fighting in late 2008. (Photo and caption by Alun McDonald)

UN peacekeepers set up a military checkpoint in North Kivu, eastern Congo. (Photo and caption by Alun McDonald)

Red Cross tented hospital in North Kivu, eastern Congo. (Photo and caption by Alun McDonald)

Main street in Goma, the state capital in eastern Congo. The volcano - which glows red at night - dominates the town. (Photo and caption by Alun McDonald)

Enough Project: RAISE Hope for Congo music

2010-06-08T17:57:00.004+01:00

Press Release
For Immediate Release: June 8, 2010
Contact:
Ashley Bryan, Press Here, ashley@pressherepublicity.com,
212-246-2640
Jonathan Hutson, Enough Project, jhutson@enoughproject.org,
857-919-5130

THE ENOUGH PROJECT AND MERCER STREET RECORDS PRESENT:

RAISE Hope For Congo

A compilation to help stop the world’s worst violence against women & girls as a result of conflict in Democratic Republic of the Congo

Curated by music expert Nic Harcourt, the compilation features exclusive tracks from renowned artists such as Norah Jones, Mos Def, Sheryl Crow, Angelique Kidjo,

Damien Rice, Amadou & Mariam & Bat For Lashes

AVAILABLE DIGITALLY ON JUNE 8^th; PHYSICAL RELEASE ON JUNE 22^nd

New York, NY – June 8, 2010 - Enough, a project of the Center for American Progress to end genocide and crimes against humanity, has joined forces with Mercer Street Records to release a special compilation album curated by leading music expert Nic Harcourt (Los Angeles Times, KCRW Radio, A&E Network). The compilation, titled RAISE Hope For Congo, brings together many of contemporary music’s leading artists in solidarity with Congolese women who have been the target of violence and rape amidst war in the region fueled by the demand for conflict minerals used in electronics from cell phones to computers. The incredible genre-spanning album includes exclusive unreleased tracks from Norah Jones, Mos Def, Damien Rice, Angelique Kidjo, Bat For Lashes, Rodrigo y Gabriella, Amadou & Mariam and more as well as a special reading from Sheryl Crow. The compilation is set for digital release on June 8^th and physical release on June 22^nd.

RAISE Hope For Congo was conceived by executive principle of the Unison Agency, Shahin Shahida, who serves as the compilation’s executive producer. After reading Not on Our Watch, a book by the co-founder of Enough John Prendergast, Shahida saw the need for a compilation that would help open the world’s eyes to the crisis in the Congo. Shahida's vision for the compilation was shared by colleague Zeid Masri, an investor in Downtown Music, who helped set the wheels in motion to produce and make the release a reality. The Enough Project and Mercer Street Records have produced this compilation in the effort to make the protection and empowerment of Congo’s women a priority, as well as inspire individuals around the world to raise their voice for peace in Congo. John Prendergast, a prominent human rights activist and author who was the director of African Affairs at the National Security Council during the Clinton administration, says, “One of the principal reasons why there is little international response to the terrible human rights crimes in Congo -- particularly against women and girls -- is that people just don't know that these things are happening. This compilation album will be a beacon to light the path to educating hundreds of thousands of people about the issues in Congo and what all of us can do to help end the suffering there."

All profits raised through this compilation will help fund critical field research and awareness raising efforts that will work to end the conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where the insatiable worldwide demand for electronic products is fueling violence and the use of rape as a weapon of war. The conflict has become the deadliest since World War II and the most dangerous place in the world for women and girls.

The compilation track listing is:

1. Lonely Soldier – Damien Rice

2. Not Immune – Imaad Wasif

3. Angel Mom – Jesca Hoop

4. 40 – Meshell Ndegeocello

5. Je t’aime – Staff Benda Bilili

6. Leila – Angelique Kidjo

7. Na Miso – Chantal Kreviazuk

8. World of Trouble – Norah Jones

9. My Name is Mwamaroyi – Sheryl Crow

10. Don’t Let Me – Amel Larrieux

11. Raise Hope – Omékongo Dibinga & Shahin Shahida

12. Never Again – Ozomatli & The Agahoza Shalom Youth Village

13. Sleep Alone – Bat For Lashes

14. Before You Were Young (Live at Joe’s Pub) – Travis

15. Hora Zero (Live at Wecheter) – Rodrigo y Gabriela

16. Tambara – Amadou & Mariam

17. Nsimba & Nzuzi – Konono No 1

18. Priority (A Cappella) – Mos Def

http://raisehopeforcongomusic.org/

ABOUT THE ENOUGH PROJECT:

Enough is a project of the Center for American Progress to end genocide and crimes against humanity. Founded in 2007, Enough focuses on crises in eastern Congo, Sudan, and areas of Africa affected by the Lord’s Resistance Army. Enough’s strategy papers and briefings provide sharp field analysis and targeted policy recommendations based on a “3P” crisis response strategy: promoting durable peace, providing civilian protection, and punishing perpetrators of atrocities. Enough works with concerned citizens, advocates, and policy makers to prevent, mitigate, and resolve these crises. For more information, please visit www.enoughproject.org. Enough's RAISE Hope for Congo campaign aims to build a permanent and diverse constituency of activists that will advocate for the protection and empowerment Congolese women and girls. The Enough Project will collaborate with national, grassroots, and Congolese organizations, across various constituencies and the political spectrum, to build this grassroots movement. Enough will also continue to provide policy analysis and recommendations. To learn more,

visit www.raisehopeforcongo.org.

ABOUT MERCER STREET RECORDS:

Mercer Street Records℠ is a part of Downtown Music and the sister label to Downtown Records. Mercer Street Records releases consistently incredible music and videos from David Gray, Meshell Ndegeocello, Ozomatli, Kesiah Jones, Kitty Daisy & Lewis, Asa, Jesse Harris, William Fitzsimmons, Femi Kuti and other remarkable artists from around the world.

Downtown Music, LLC is an independently owned company which operates Downtown Records, Downtown Music Publishing, Downtown Music Services (Licensing Group), RCRDLBL.com and Downtown Recording Studios. Downtown Records is comprised of its Downtown and Mercer Street imprints and joint venture partners Dim Mak, Fool’s Gold, and Mad Decent Records.

www.mercerstreetrecords.com / www.downtownmusic.com

Downtown Records is distributed by Universal Music’s Fontana Distribution, with certain releases distributed by ADA. Offices are located in New York and Los Angeles.

ABOUT UNISON AGENCY:
For nearly a decade, Unison has partnered with foundations, associations, multi-laterals, sovereign governments and non-governmental agencies as well as socially conscious companies to develop and enhance brands as a means to communicate real and lasting

change in the world. They are dedicated to helping clients champion their causes and continue their lifelong work as activists through sustainable brand equity and cause marketing efforts.

Their clients include the Global Fund Against AIDS, TB and Malaria, Friends of the Global Fight, United Nations, The Enough Project at The Center for American Progress, Ocean

Conservancy, The Endeavor Group, U.S.-U.A.E. Business Council, U.S. Green Building Council, The German Marshall Fund of the U.S. and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, to name a few.

For more information, visit: http://www.unisonagency.com.

Source: Enough Project, 1225 Eye St. NW., Washington, DC 20005 United States

UN investigates claims of unreported February massacre in N.E. DR Congo

2010-05-02T17:26:00.033+01:00

A senior UN official says as many as 100 people were killed in the alleged attack, which is believed to have taken place in February

John Holmes, the UN humanitarian chief, said on a visit to the country that an investigation was under way.

If the claims are true it would bring the number of people killed between December and March to more than 500.

The UN says that in the same period, more than 300 others - nearly half of them children - were abducted. An unknown number of villagers were also mutilated, according to the UN.

Source: BBC News - see report here below, plus eight others from DR Congo.

Photo of DR Congo LRA kidnap victim:
“They told me I was talking too much”

LRA kidnap victim Marie Mbolihundele, who says she was held by three LRA rebels in a northern area of Niangara, DR Congo two weeks ago, says they sliced her lips off and one of her ears.

"They ordered me to lie down on the ground and they told me I shouldn't scream or they would kill me," she said.

"I started to pray, and then they pulled my lips with pliers and cut them off with a knife. Then they told me to run, so I stood up and fled."

Source: BBC report (see below) by Thomas Fessy in DR Congo 02 May 2010.

Photo: A 23-year-old woman wore a bandage in a Niangara, Congo, hospital on Saturday, 17 days after a group of Lord’s Resistance Army rebels cut off her lips and right ear during an attack. (Photographer Jehad Nga for The New York Times) Source: NYT report here below.

U.N. Says Congo Rebels Killed Scores in Village
From The New York Times
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN
Saturday 01 May 2010

(KISANGANI, Congo) - United Nations officials said Saturday that the Lord’s Resistance Army rebel force killed up to 100 people in a previously unreported massacre in the remote northeastern corner of this country.

Details are still emerging of exactly what happened. But according to John Holmes, the United Nation’s top humanitarian official, the L.R.A. struck a small village in February, two months after it killed more than 300 people from several villages in the surrounding area.

United Nations investigators have spoken with several witnesses and victims of the massacre in February, including two fishermen who said they saw dozens of bodies.

But the investigators have been unable to reach the exact location because of the difficulties of traveling in one of the most rugged and isolated corners of Africa.

Mr. Holmes said that while recent military operations may have weakened the L.R.A., “they are still capable of wreaking absolute havoc — and they still do.”

He said he learned about the February attack on Saturday, when he met with local authorities and victims in Niangara, an old trading post hidden away in the Congolese jungle that has recently been ringed by roving bands of L.R.A. marauders.

One of the people he met was a young woman whose lips had been sliced off last month. She was attacked by rebels while working in her field, she said Saturday, sitting in a hospital bed, her face a mask of gauze and tape.

“They told me I was talking too much,” she said.

The L.R.A. has been waging a brutal and bizarre rebellion for more than 20 years, starting in northern Uganda in the late 1980s.

Originally, it said it was guided by the Ten Commandments, but soon it was breaking every one, massacring and mutilating civilians and becoming notorious for kidnapping young children and turning them into 4-foot-tall killing machines.

The Ugandan Army eventually drove the L.R.A. out of Uganda but the rebels simply marched into neighboring northeastern Congo, where they set up bases in isolated areas.

Recently, the Ugandan military has killed dozens of fighters hiding out in Congo and the Central African Republic, though the L.R.A.’s leader, Joseph Kony, who has been indicted by the International Criminal Court on crimes against humanity, is still on the loose.

In the December massacre, the L.R.A. killed more than 300 people in a brutal recruitment campaign near Niangara, in which a few dozen rebel fighters abducted hundreds of civilians, marching them in a human chain from village to village. Along the way, the fighters beat to death men, women and children they did not want to keep in their ranks.

“For anyone saying that the L.R.A. is finished, I would be careful not to count them out,” Mr. Holmes said. “They have an amazing capacity to regenerate themselves, especially by kidnapping children.”

Top UN man investigates massacre claims in DR Congo
From BBC News by THOMAS FESSY in DR Congo
03:48 GMT, Sunday, 2 May 2010 04:48 UK - excerpt:

Photo: Nearly half the people abducted were children, the UN says

A senior UN official says as many as 100 people were killed in the alleged attack, which is believed to have taken place in February.

John Holmes, the UN humanitarian chief, said on a visit to the country that an investigation was under way.

If the claims are true it would bring the number of people killed between December and March to more than 500.

Mr Holmes said rebels from the Lord's Resistance Army had carried out the massacre in the village of Kpanga in the north-east of the country, near the border with southern Sudan and the Central African Republic.

After visiting the remote town of Niangara, near the site of the alleged killings, Mr Holmes said an investigation had been launched to find out exactly what had happened.

It would bring the total number of people killed in DR Congo between December and March to more than 500.

The UN says that in the same period, more than 300 others - nearly half of them children - were abducted. An unknown number of villagers were also mutilated, according to the UN.

Among them is Marie Mbolihundele, who says she was held by three LRA rebels in a northern area of Niangara two weeks ago. She says they sliced her lips off and one of her ears.

"They ordered me to lie down on the ground and they told me I shouldn't scream or they would kill me," she said.

"I started to pray, and then they pulled my lips with pliers and cut them off with a knife. Then they told me to run, so I stood up and fled." (...)

Photo: An Indian peacekeeper from Monuc, the United Nations Mission in Congo, on patrol. (Photograph: Emmanuel Braun/Reuters) Source: see Guardian report here below

Lord's Resistance Army massacres up to 100 in Congolese village
From The Guardian
By ASSOCIATED PRESS ‎(NIANGARA, DR Congo)
Sunday 02 May 2010 - excerpt:

Among recent victims Holmes met was Cornelia Yekpalile, a 23-year-old mother of four, who was mutilated 18 days ago when she went to fields near her village of Kpizimbi, set in dense forest in north-eastern Congo, to collect spinach-like pondu leaves to cook for lunch.

At Niangara hospital, where she is being cared for by Médecins sans Frontières, Yekpalile said she would not be going home when her wounds healed.

"There's no security in the villages," she said. "Here there are soldiers."

She said she had no idea why the rebels hacked off her lips and her right ear. "I was crying for mercy and crying 'Oh my God, oh my God, help me.' They said they would kill me if I carried on making a noise and then they did this," she said, pressing a bandage to a mouth covered in plaster.

UN says investigating LRA massacre of 100 in Congo
From The Washington Post
By THOMAS HUBERT (Reuters) in NYANGARA, DR Congo
(Additional reporting and writing by David Lewis; Editing by Elizabeth Fullerton)
Sunday 02 May 2010; 10:38 AM - excerpt:

Leontine Masini, another resident, spoke of a six-month ordeal that ended when she escaped as the fighters were asleep.

"They take wooden sticks and ask those who have been captured to hit someone with that stick on the head. If you don't kill that person, you are being hit too," she said.

The 25 year-old said she had witnessed so many murders that "there is no way" to put a number on it. "I did hit people. I didn't kill them, so I got hit, too," she added.

UN reports massacre of 100 villagers in Congo
From The Associated Press by MICHELLE FAUL in NIANGARA, Congo
Sunday, 02 May 2010 - excerpt:

When Holmes visited the village of Mwenga on Friday, he was met by women singing a poignant song. "We are the living dead. They rape us! There's no life without women. There can be no Congo without women," they sang. Tears ran down the faces of some of the chanting women.

On Sunday, Holmes visits Mbandaka in northwest Congo, where a new rebellion has erupted. Enyele militiamen this month attacked U.N. peacekeepers guarding the airport, killing a Ghanaian peacekeeper and a South African pilot along with some 20 civilians.

That rebellion, in Equateur province, began between tribesmen fighting over farming and fishing rights. But the Enyele militiamen, in an Easter Sunday attack, targeted strategic and government locations. It took Congolese troops and U.N. peacekeepers two days' fighting to retake the airport. (...)

Mattia Novella, field coordinator for Doctors Without Borders, said they see few wounded patients. "As I understand it, they do not wound, they kill, that's why we don't received many injured people."

Ugandan Rebels Kill 100 Civilians in Congo, UN Says (Update1)
From Bloomberg BusinessWeek
By MICHAEL J. KAVANAGH in KISANGANI, DR Congo
Sunday, 02 May 2010, 5:52 AM EDT
(Editors: Alastair Reed, Stephen Taylor.
To contact the reporter on this story: Michael Kavanagh in Kisangani at mkavanagh9@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Paul Richardson at pmrichardson@bloomberg.net) - excerpt:

The LRA has killed almost 1,800 Congolese civilians since 2007, including 407 since December, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. The February attacks could bring the total above 500, it said. (...)

A joint military operation against the rebels by the Congolese and Ugandan armies began in December 2008, with the Ugandans getting support and training from the U.S. The offensive has weakened and scattered the LRA throughout northeastern Congo, southern Sudan and the Central African Republic, Holmes said. “Unfortunately, this scattering makes it even more dangerous than before,” he said.

The rebels are now traveling in groups of five to 10, attacking villages and threatening civilians, Holmes said. As many as 300,000 people have been displaced by LRA attacks and hundreds have been kidnapped, according to the OCHA. (...)

The region where the rebels operate is remote and hard to access, complicating efforts by the army and peacekeepers to secure villages and provide aid to the displaced.

The Congolese government has asked the UN peacekeepers to leave the country by 2011, something Holmes said would be detrimental to the fight against the LRA. “The presence of MONUC in the territory is essential in terms of protection of civilians,” he said.

“We’ve tried to finish this movement militarily many times. We’ve tried politically with a peace accord that wasn’t signed,” he said. “It’s up to the international community to come up with a solution to end this reign of terror.”

UN says Congo pull-out would undermine aid work
From The Washington Post
By THOMAS HUBERT (Reuters) in BUKAVU, DR Congo
(Writing by Richard Valdmanis; Editing by Maria Golovnina)
Saturday, 01 ‎May 2010‎ - excerpt:

Aid groups say Congo's national army is responsible for atrocities against the civilians they are charged to protect.

The U.N. is resisting pressure from Congolese President Joseph Kabila to start pulling out its force, known as MONUC, by the 50th anniversary of Congo's independence on June 30. (...)

U.N. peacekeepers have been in the central African nation since a 1998-2003 war that killed millions. The force has since grown in the world's largest global peacekeeping mission.

Congo's government says however that it is time for U.N. forces to pull out because of increasing evidence that its forces are prepared to fill the gap left by MONUC's departure.

During Holmes' visit to south Kivu, a region in Congo's east where Rwandan Hutu FDLR rebels are active, a villager told him she was afraid of government forces in the next town.

"The 14th brigade, which is based in Kitutu and has a bad reputation, must be taken out for our protection," she told him.

Belgium's ambassador to Kinshasa, Dominique Struye de Swielande, said this month he was concerned about a hasty withdrawal of MONUC forces.

UN relief chief speaks out against Ugandan rebel violence in DR Congo
From UN News Centre - Saturday 01 May 2010 - excerpt:

In Niangara today, Mr. Holmes heard first-hand accounts from survivors, including one woman whose lips and ear had been torn off two days ago in a typically barbaric and inexplicable attack.

“This is unacceptable. We need a rapid solution to what has become a regional crisis,” he emphasized.

In meetings with authorities and humanitarian workers in the area, the official voiced concern that the possible drawdown of the UN peacekeeping mission in the country, known as MONUC, could have negative effects on the protection of civilians and on humanitarian access.

“MONUC is a deterrent for the LRA, and its presence is also essential to humanitarian operations in this province,” he stated. “I am concerned that their departure could increase the suffering of civilians, and reduce our ability to help them.”

Seven UN agencies and 23 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) carry out humanitarian work in Orientale Province's Haut-Uele and Bas-Uele districts, combined are home to at least 320,000 persons uprooted by LRA-related violence.

Due to the ongoing threat posed by the group's presence, the internally displaced persons (IDPs) have little prospects of returning home in the near future.

Aid workers have been able to reach nearly two-thirds of the displaced population, but face obstacles on a daily basis due to insecurity and the inaccessibility of many of the IDPs in an area with little or no road coverage.

Yesterday, Mr. Holmes visited uprooted people in Mwenga, approximately 80 kilometres south-west of the city of Bukavu, the capital of South Kivu province, also in northeast DRC.

“Civilians continue to suffer enormously and disproportionately in this armed conflict,” he said in Mwenga, where he helped launch a new feeding programme of the UN World Food Programme (WFP).

North and South Kivu provinces have been ravaged by armed conflict mainly pitting DRC's national army against insurgents of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, better known as FDLR, the group's French acronym.

Local armed militias and bandits also contribute to insecurity in the two Kivu provinces, where an estimated 1.4 million people are internally displaced, more than 70 per cent of whom live with host families, increasing the burden on a population with already-scarce resources.

D.R. Congo: UN Humanitarian Chief Condemns LRA Violence
From United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
Saturday 01 May 2010 (via ReliefWeb):

(Kinshasa/New York/Geneva, 01 May 2010): On the third day of his visit to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator John Holmes visited the troubled Haut-Uele District of Orientale Province, located in north-eastern DRC on the border with Sudan and the Central African Republic (CAR).

"In this district, the Lord's Resistance Army [LRA] has continued to commit horrific atrocities against civilians, who are now displaced with no prospect of going back home any time soon", Mr. Holmes said after a visit to Niangara, located approximately 90 kilometres west of the district capital Dungu. "This is unacceptable. We need a rapid solution to what has become a regional crisis," he said.

The area was the scene of one of the worst massacres recently committed by the LRA. During the second week of December 2009, over 300 civilians were reportedly killed and over 250, including at least 80 children, kidnapped. Since December 2007, around 1,800 civilians are thought to have been killed by the LRA, and 2,400 abducted, throughout the province. In Niangara, Mr. Holmes was able to hear first hand appalling testimony from survivors, including one woman whose lips and ear had been torn off two weeks ago in a typically barbaric and inexplicable attack.

During meetings with authorities and humanitarians there and in the provincial capital Kisangani, Mr. Holmes expressed concern that the possible drawdown of the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC) would have negative effects on the protection of civilians and humanitarian access. "MONUC is a deterrent for the LRA, and its presence is also essential to humanitarian operations in this province", he stated. "I am concerned that their departure could increase the suffering of civilians, and reduce our ability to help them", he added.

In addition to the DRC, the LRA has attacked civilians in Southern Sudan and the CAR, since being driven out of Northern Uganda some years ago.

Seven United Nations entities and 23 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) carry out humanitarian work in the Haut-Uele and Bas-Uele districts. The districts host at least 320,000 persons internally displaced by LRA-related violence. Because of the continued threat posed by the LRA's presence, they have little prospects of returning home in the near future. Humanitarians have been able to assist an estimated 65% of the displaced population, but they face obstacles on a daily basis due to persistent insecurity and the inaccessibility of many of the displaced, in an area with little or no road coverage.

For further information, please call: OCHA Kinshasa: Maurizio Giuliano, +243 995 901 533, giuliano@un.org; Stefania Trassari, +243 99 2906637, trassari@un.org; OCHA-New York: Stephanie Bunker, +1 917 367 5126, mobile +1 347 244 2106, bunker@un.org; Nicholas Reader, +1 212 963 4961, mobile +1 646 752 3117, reader@un.org,
OCHA-Geneva: Elisabeth Byrs, +41 22 917 2653, mobile +41 79 473 4570, byrs@un.org
OCHA press releases are available at http://ochaonline.un.org or www.reliefweb.int

The mission of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is to mobilize and coordinate effective and principled humanitarian action in partnership with national and international actors [end of copy]

Top UN man in DR Congo mission as unrest escalates

2010-04-30T12:30:00.004+01:00

John Holmes will meet president Joseph Kabila during five-day mission.

Top UN man in DR Congo mission as unrest escalates
From BBC News, Kinshasa
By Thomas Fessy at 22:59 GMT, Thursday, 29 April 2010 23:59 UK:

The UN's top humanitarian official has flown into the troubled Democratic Republic of Congo as armed groups continue to spread insecurity.

John Holmes will travel to three provinces where humanitarian workers face increasingly difficult conditions.

He will also visit a region where tens of thousands of people have reportedly been forced to flee their homes.

Human rights abuses such as rapes and lootings are reported regularly in the country.

Fighting and banditry

Mr Holmes will visit the Kivu region, where a military campaign backed by the UN against Rwandan Hutu rebels has forced tens of thousands of people to flee their homes.

Aid workers say better protection for civilians was promised at the end of similar joint military operations last year.

But, in reality, human rights abuses such as rapes and lootings are reported regularly.

And, they say, displacements of populations are constant. The situation is becoming increasingly difficult for humanitarian workers whose operations have been restricted by fighting and banditry.

As a result, thousands of people in need are left with no assistance.

Mr Holmes is also travelling to the north-eastern part of the country, where attacks by Ugandan rebels from the Lord's Resistance Army on villages are still frequent.

His Congo tour will eventually take him to the western province of Equateur, where a recent insurgency by Enyele fighters has pushed thousands of people into the bush.

The Congolese authorities have asked the UN mission to prepare for a withdrawal; Mr Holmes will be discussing civilian protection issues with President Joseph Kabila on Monday.

DR Congo: More than 8,000 women were raped during fighting in 2009, the UN says

2010-04-29T10:04:00.003+01:00

Women in DR Congo are being escorted to market by UN troops.

UN official calls DR Congo 'rape capital of the world'
From BBC News online at 16:50 GMT, Wednesday, 28 April 2010 17:50 UK:

The Democratic Republic of Congo is "the rape capital of the world", a senior UN official has said.

Margot Wallstrom, the UN's special representative on sexual violence in conflict, urged the Security Council to punish the perpetrators in DR Congo.

Rape remained a dominant feature of the ongoing conflict in eastern DR Congo, with impunity being the rule rather than the exception, she said.

More than 8,000 women were raped during fighting in 2009, the UN says.

"Women have no rights, if those who violate their rights go unpunished," Ms Wallstrom told the UN Security Council on her return from DR Congo.

"If women continue to suffer sexual violence, it is not because the law is inadequate to protect them, but because it is inadequately enforced," she said.

The UN mission in DR Congo, Monuc, has been trying to deal with the problem by escorting women on their way to market, developing early warning systems and working with local officials, according to a UN statement.

In April, research on sexual violence in DR Congo's eastern South Kivu province produced shocking findings.

The report by the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative showed that 60% of rape victims in South Kivu were gang raped by armed men, more than half of the assaults took place in the victims' homes and an increasing number of attacks were being carried out by civilians.

Eastern DR Congo is still plagued by army and militia violence despite the end of the country's five-year war in 2003.

Monuc troops have been backing efforts to defeat rebels linked to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, who are operating in eastern DR Congo.

Enough Project: Florida Students Turn to Facebook to Find Congressional Champion for Congo

2010-04-19T17:13:00.003+01:00

Copy of Enough Project Press Release:

EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE UNTIL:
April 19, 2010

CONTACT:
Jonathan Hutson, Enough Project, 857-919-5130
jhutson@enoughproject.org

Florida Students Turn to Facebook To Find Congressional Champion for Congo

Enough Project campaign uses social media to ask Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen to Change the Equation for Congo

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- On April 19, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) will find some new faces on his/her official Facebook page, as part of an innovative human rights campaign to "Change the Equation for Congo."

Enough Project, local partners and student advocacy groups are launching a five-day effort to gain ten new Congressional sponsors for the Conflict Minerals Trade Act, using Facebook, Twitter, and viral videos. On each of the five days, grassroots supporters will focus on two of the targeted representatives, posting messages on their Facebook walls urging them to co-sponsor the bill, while tweeting this same message and using other innovative social media tools to spread the word.

The Conflict Minerals Trade Act is a bi-partisan bill that, if passed into law, will give consumers a choice to purchase conflict-free electronics products. It must pass through two powerful committees, the Foreign Affairs Committee and the Ways and Means Committee, before it can be put to a vote in the full House of Representatives. Each of the ten representatives targeted by Change the Equation for Congo is a member of one of these committees.

Along with the Enough Project and partners, local student advocacy groups will be driving the Change the Equation for Congo effort. Among the participating local groups are chapters of the student-led anti-genocide project STAND from Florida, Arizona, California and other states across the nation.

"We're seeking ten new Congressional champions, including Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, to co-sponsor the Conflict Minerals Trade Act," said John Norris, Executive Director of the Enough Project at Center for American Progress in Washington, D.C. "This bipartisan bill will help take the fuel out of the conflict by giving consumers a choice to buy conflict-free cell phones and other electronics. Human rights advocates, faith groups and electronics manufacturers alike have praised the bill as a vital step toward creating a practical and enforceable means to end the conflict minerals trade that funds mass atrocities in Congo."

Student groups in Representative Ros-Lehtinen's district have been vocal in pushing for support of the Conflict Minerals Trade Act.

Marilyn Winkle, Florida state representative of the student anti-genocide group STAND says; "It's critical that we urge our congressional leaders to support this bill before another legislative cycle passes. The people of the Congo deserve it."

The Center for American Progress is a nonpartisan research and educational institute dedicated to promoting a strong, just and free America that ensures opportunity for all. We believe that Americans are bound together by a common commitment to these values and we aspire to ensure that our national policies reflect these values. Enough is a project of the Center for American Progress to end genocide and crimes against humanity. Founded in 2007, Enough focuses on crises in Sudan, Chad, eastern Congo, northern Uganda, Somalia, and Zimbabwe. Enough’s strategy papers and briefings provide sharp field analysis and targeted policy recommendations based on a “3P” crisis response strategy: promoting durable peace, providing civilian protection, and punishing perpetrators of atrocities. Enough works with concerned citizens, advocates, and policy makers to prevent, mitigate, and resolve these crises. For more information, contact Jonathan Hutson, jhutson [AT] enoughproject.org, 857-919-5130.

The Economist is looking for a new Africa correspondent to be based in London

2010-04-18T00:00:00.004+01:00

Africa correspondent
From The Economist print edition 15 April 2010:

The Economist is looking for a new Africa correspondent to be based in London, to edit and commission articles, to write on African issues, and to report from any part of the continent. Please send applications, including a covering letter, cv and two past articles, to newafricapost@economist.com by May 3rd.

Where is the Telegraph's David Blair these days, I wonder. He'd do a great job as Africa correspondent for The Economist. I miss his reporting on Africa.

Eight Red Cross staff kidnapped near Fizi in South Kivu by Mai Mai Yakutumba militia

2010-04-13T13:59:00.003+01:00

Red Cross: 8 staff kidnapped in eastern Congo
From The Associated Press, Tuesday, 13 April 2010:

GENEVA - Eight Red Cross staff have been kidnapped by an armed group in eastern Congo, the international aid agency said Tuesday.

The seven Congolese and one Swiss national were seized Friday afternoon near the town of Fizi in South Kivu province by the Mai Mai Yakutumba rebels, the International Committee of the Red Cross said in Geneva.

"The ICRC has been able to get in touch with some of our colleagues after the incident," spokesman Marcal Izard told The Associated Press.

He declined to say whether the Red Cross is in contact with the kidnappers.

The Swiss Foreign Ministry said it was aware of the situation and was in touch with the Red Cross and Congolese authorities.

The Red Cross has several offices in South Kivu, which like much of eastern Congo has been wracked by violence since the 1994 genocide in neighboring Rwanda spilled war across the border. The shadowy Mai Mai militia is one of many armed groups in the area. Their fighters have been seen using rudimentary weapons like spears and their group is believed to value mysticism.

In early 2009, a top rebel leader from another militia was arrested and the Congolese government began a campaign to integrate all militias, including the Mai Mai, into the national army.

"It is in order to protect and assist armed-conflict victims that we have been carrying out our activities in the area," said Franz Rauchenstein, the head of the ICRC's mission in Congo.

"We continue to insist that the strictly neutral, impartial and humanitarian nature of our work be recognized, and that our colleagues be able to return to their loved ones soon," he said in a statement.

Staff of the neutral aid group have also been targeted for kidnapping in other conflict regions recently.

Three foreign Red Cross workers were kidnapped in the Philippines last year, and French staff members were seized in Chad and Sudan. All have since been released.

Uganda enlists ex-rebel forces to end a war

2010-04-11T20:18:00.000+01:00

Ugandan soldiers on patrol in the Congo look for tracks of the Lord’s Resistance Army in late March 2010. Former rebels of the LRA have now been given the mission to hunt down their one-time boss Joseph Kony and his remaining forces. (Jeffrey Gettleman / New York Times News Service)

Uganda enlists ex-rebel forces to end a war
By Jeffrey Gettleman / New York Times News Service
Published: April 11. 2010 4:00AM PST

OBO, Central African Republic — The night is inky, the helicopters are late and Cmdr. Patrick Opiyo Makasi sits near a dying cooking fire on a remote army base, spinning his thoughts into the darkness.

“It was either them or me,” Makasi said of the countless people he has killed. “Them or me.”

The Lord’s Resistance Army, a notoriously brutal rebel group, snatched him from a riverbank when he was 12 years old, more than 20 years ago, and trained him to burn, pillage and slaughter. His name, Makasi, means scissors in Kiswahili, and fellow soldiers said he earned it by shearing off ears and lips.

But now he has a new mission: hunting down his former boss.

In an unorthodox strategy that could help end this seemingly pointless war, the Ugandan army is deploying special squads of experienced killers to track down the LRA’s leader, Joseph Kony, one of the most wanted men in Africa, who has been on the run for more than 20 years.

These soldiers, like Makasi, are former LRA fighters themselves, and just about all of them were abducted as children. They recently surrendered and are now wading through black rivers and head-high elephant grass across three of the most troubled countries in the world — the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan — where the last remnants of the LRA are believed to be hiding. They say they know all of Kony’s tricks.

Some critics may not think this wise, putting so much trust in men whose moral compass had been turned upside down for so long.

But the Ugandan government is desperate to finish this conflict, which has raged for more than two decades and killed thousands. The government’s policy is to grant amnesty to all LRA fighters except the top three, who have been indicted by the International Criminal Court: Kony; Okot Odhiambo, his deputy; and Dominic Ongwen, another commander who is widely believed to have planned a massacre in Congo in December in which hundreds of civilians were bludgeoned to death.

Security Council Report: Seeking a New Compact: Resolution 1906 and the Future of MONUC

2010-04-09T21:54:00.002+01:00

Security Council Report has published a Special Research Report: Seeking a New Compact: Resolution 1906 and the Future of MONUC.

In April the Security Council will undertake a mission to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and neighbouring countries. The main issue under consideration will be the future role of the UN peacekeeping mission in the DRC and the development of a new vision for it that will help to build a new compact with the DRC government acceptable to both the government and the Council. At the heart of this exercise will be resolution 1906, which the Council adopted in December 2009 to extend the mandate of the mission until the end of May. At this crucial time, we offer an in-depth analysis of this long and complex text.

Special Research Report in PDF

________________________________________________________________________________

Security Council Report
One Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza
885 2nd Avenue @ 48th St, 31st Fl
New York NY 10017

T: 212.759.9429 F: 212.759.4038
contact@securitycouncilreport.org
www.securitycouncilreport.org

DR Congo attack kills two UN workers

2010-04-05T07:52:00.003+01:00

Heavily armed rebels attacked the town of Mbandaka and overran the airport, UN officials said, killing a Ghanaian peacekeeper and another UN employee.

The BBC's Thomas Fessy in Kinshasa says the joint operation to retake the airport, launched by Congolese and UN troops, has been suspended overnight, and should resume in the early hours of the morning.

Full story: BBC News, Monday, 05 April 2010 -
DR Congo attack kills two UN workers

UN probe into alleged massacre in remote northeast of DR Congo continues

2010-03-31T19:21:00.003+01:00

UN probe into alleged massacre in remote northeast of DR Congo continues
From UN News Centre, 29 March 2010:

Photo: Refugees who fled LRA attacks in DRC being registered in Gangura, southern Sudan

United Nations inquiries are continuing into a recent massacre of civilians in the remote northeast of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), reportedly by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), a UN spokesperson confirmed today.

The killings are reported to have occurred in the village of Mabanga in December, and human rights groups say at least 320 people were murdered. Machetes, axes and heavy wooden sticks were apparently used to carry out the killings.

Martin Nesirky, the Secretary-General’s spokesperson, told reporters in New York that the UN cannot confirm the exact number of victims until the formal investigation by the UN peacekeeping mission in the DRC (known as MONUC) has been completed.

The extreme remoteness of the area and the fact that witnesses may have moved were delaying efforts to gather reliable information, he said.

Mr. Nesirky said that MONUC strives to provide protection to all civilians in the area, but given the vast size of the territory, peacekeepers were only able to concentrate their efforts on the most populated areas.

The mission, however, continued to provide support to Government troops carrying out operations against the LRA, a notorious rebel group formed in Uganda in the 1980s whose leaders have been indicted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) on war crimes charges.

Asked about MONUC’s strategy in dealing with the LRA, whose members often cross the border into the DRC and other neighbouring countries, Mr. Nesirky noted that the head of MONUC, Alan Doss, had reiterated that the area involved was equivalent to the size of Spain and protecting all civilians at all times was not feasible.

Ben Affleck launches the Eastern Congo Initiative (ECI)

2010-03-22T16:55:00.004Z

Press Release from Eastern Congo Initiative
Ben Affleck Launches Initiative to Support Local Solutions in Eastern Congo
LOS ANGELES, 22 March 2010 /PRNewswire:

Actor, director and advocate Ben Affleck today announced the launch of the Eastern Congo Initiative (ECI), an advocacy and grant-making initiative with the mission of helping the Congolese people support local community-based approaches that create a sustainable and successful society in the long-troubled region. ECI is the first U.S. based advocacy and grant-making initiative wholly focused on working with and for the people of eastern Congo.

In founding ECI, Affleck brings together a unique coalition of partners from across the public and private sectors who are interested in helping the people of eastern Congo create abundant opportunities for economic and social development, so that civil society can flourish. Additional founding members include Howard G. Buffett, Humanity United, the Bridgeway Foundation, Jewish World Watch and others.

ECI will support community-based organizations (CBOs) that are applying local solutions in the areas of:

Support for survivors of rape and sexual violence

Returning and reintegrating child soldiers into their communities

Community-level peace and reconciliation programs

Increasing access to health care and education

Promoting economic opportunity

ECI will support the development of CBOs through grants and capacity-building support. ECI will also work to raise awareness among policymakers and the media in the U.S. and Europe about the ongoing challenges in the region, and share the stories of hope found there through www.easterncongo.org and the use of multimedia.

“The situation in eastern Congo has been neglected for far too long – it is one of the worst humanitarian tragedies in the world,” said Affleck, who returned today from a five-day trip to the region. “I brought together this unique collection of partners in order to bring their experience in humanitarian relief and sustainable development to bear as we focus like never before on local solutions to challenges in this region. Right now, the attention paid to this crisis doesn’t match the needs of those affected by it. We will raise that attention level, and work with the extraordinary Congolese people who are making a positive difference in their own communities.”

Ambassador Faida Mitifu, the Ambassador of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to the United States and a member of ECI’s Advisory Committee, congratulated ECI on its launch today, saying, “The Eastern Congo Initiative will help to bring much-needed attention to a region that has suffered for too long. An approach that focuses on community-based solutions and highlights the vision of local organizations that serve those affected by conflict is essential. We applaud Ben and the founding members for their foresight and commitment and look forward to working closely with the Eastern Congo Initiative. “

ECI has developed an advocacy and grant-making framework that focuses on maximizing impact. ECI has a team in the region whose primary objective is conducting extensive research to evaluate and support CBOs and prioritize advocacy efforts for long-term sustainability.

“I joined Ben in this effort because I believe strongly in investing in sustainable solutions to humanitarian challenges,” said Howard Buffett, ECI Founding Member, businessman and philanthropist. “My experience is that when you support locally initiated efforts, you lay a foundation for change that lasts long after relief agencies have left. I’m confident in Ben’s ability to bring a coalition of partners together who will influence a broader diplomatic strategy, increase philanthropic investment and foster coordination among the many organizations already doing great work in the region.”

More than a decade of conflict, political instability and poverty have left eastern Congo, its infrastructure, productive land and institutions decimated to the point that the government cannot provide for the basic food, health, education and security needs of its population. The DRC is one of the poorest countries in the world, ranked 179th out of 182 on the UN’s Human Development Index.

Interethnic violence, since the 1994 Rwandan genocide spilled over into eastern Congo, has claimed the lives of more than five million people. It has forced millions more Congolese from their homes, villages and farms, resulting in widespread poverty and insecurity. Despite a 2008 peace agreement between 22 militias – many best-known for their practices of forced-recruitment of child soldiers and employing sexual violence as a weapon – sporadic violence continues to terrorize people in the region and hamper relief and development efforts. The UN reported in January that an estimated 160 women are raped each week in the Kivu provinces of eastern Congo, and that 30 percent of those in need of assistance in the region are inaccessible to international NGOs because of poor roads and insecurity.

In 2006, the country held its first democratic elections in 40 years. It has a new constitution that dramatically increases local representation and the rule of law, and will hold its next election in 2011. The UN and several international NGOs are on the ground providing security and humanitarian support. The Congolese people have formed community-based organizations to offer locally developed solutions to some of the most challenging legacies of conflict and human rights abuse in the region.

ECI takes the position that increasing attention to what is working in Congo – which investments are creating economic opportunities and, how communities are healing, shining a light on human rights abuses, and supporting public/private partnerships will have a positive and lasting impact.

More information including images and videos about ECI, and background on the crisis and the people and organizations making a difference in the region can be found at www.easterncongo.org.

About the Eastern Congo Initiative:

Founded in 2010 by Ben Affleck, the Eastern Congo Initiative (ECI) is a project of the New Venture Fund, a 501(c)(3) charity registered in the United States. Additional founding members include: Howard G. Buffett, Humanity United, the Bridgeway Foundation, Jewish World Watch and others.

The Eastern Congo Initiative is an advocacy and grant-making initiative wholly focused on working with and for the people of eastern Congo. ECI provides support for Congolese organizations working to develop community-based approaches that create a sustainable and successful society in eastern Congo.

SOURCE: Eastern Congo Initiative

Congolese mines’ harsh human toll is no deep, dark secret

2010-03-17T17:02:00.004Z

Many mines are controlled by armed groups that ransack the land’s resources to buy weapons, robbing the country of tax revenues, and creating a situation the United Nations Security Council describes as “the world’s leading example of the financial losses and human suffering caused by illegal trafficking in natural resources.’’

From The Boston Globe
Mines’ harsh human toll is no deep, dark secret
Congo’s resources ransacked for minerals used in high-tech devices

Photo credit: Finbarr O’Reilly /Reuters

By Emily Sweeney
Globe Staff / March 15, 2010

In the heart of central Africa, an exhausted young man toils at a dangerous job: digging up bits of minerals from the earth. While he earns little for his efforts, soldiers that illegally control the mine reap the profits. The fruits of his labor are smuggled to neighboring countries, sold to multinational companies, and processed into metals that end up in cellphones, computers, and digital cameras.

That is the scenario portrayed by advocacy groups that say the illicit trade of minerals in the Democratic Republic of Congo is fueling violence and human rights abuses.

Many mines are controlled by armed groups that ransack the land’s resources to buy weapons, robbing the country of tax revenues, and creating a situation the United Nations Security Council describes as “the world’s leading example of the financial losses and human suffering caused by illegal trafficking in natural resources.’’

The destruction may be happening more than 6,500 miles away, but it’s closer to home than many people realize, according to the Enough Project at the Center for American Progress, a think tank based in Washington, D.C. “Ultimately, our cellphones, laptops, and other consumer electronics have been feeding into this war,’’ said David Sullivan, a researcher with the group.

The road from rural mines to retail store shelves where such electronic devices are sold is long and twisted, and until recently most US consumers knew nothing about it.

That is slowly changing.

Several efforts are underway to shed more light on the supply chain that leads to the cellphone in your pocket and the laptop on your desk.

US Representatives Barney Frank of Newton, James P. McGovern of Worcester, and Michael E. Capuano of Somerville support the Conflict Minerals Trade Act, which would require companies to certify whether their goods contain minerals that originate from conflict areas of Congo. The measure focuses on gold, cassiterite, wolframite, and columbite-tantalite (also known as coltan), minerals common in consumer electronics products.

The bill was introduced in November by US Representative Jim McDermott, a Democrat from Washington state who hopes it will raise awareness. “I’m always worried about what’s going on there,’’ said McDermott. “Central Africa is a black hole in the earth for most people.’’

McDermott’s legislation highlights problems that have long plagued Congo, a country that holds vast amounts of mineral wealth, but remains one of the poorest nations in the world. In the eastern part of the country, illegal Congolese and foreign militia groups have run rampant for years. They have kidnapped and forced civilians to work as laborers, soldiers, and sex slaves. Men and boys are also exploited through debt bondage, and coerced into working in mines for extremely low wages, according to the State Department. Such armed groups “are simply stealing ore and selling it to the international market,’’ said McDermott, and “everyone who has a cellphone has a piece of the action.’’

Similar legislation was introduced last April by US Senator Sam Brownback, a Kansas Republican, and Democratic Senators Richard Durbin of Illinois and Russ Feingold of Wisconsin. Their measure would require companies to disclose their use of Congolese minerals to the Securities and Exchange Commission every year. So far three senators from New England — Patrick J. Leahy and Bernie Sanders of Vermont, and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island — have signed on as cosponsors.

Congress also recently passed a defense budget that calls for the State Department to create a map of mineral-rich areas that are under the control of armed groups in Congo.

In April, manufacturers and processors of tantalum — a high-performance metal used in many electronic devices — will convene in Boston to brainstorm on ways they can specify the source of tantalum responsibly. The gathering is being sponsored by the Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition, an association of 40 global companies that includes Apple Inc., Dell Inc., Intel Corp., EMC Corp., and Best Buy.

The Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition and another industry group, the Global e-Sustainability Initiative, are working to develop a way to certify smelters who obtain tantalum through “socially and environmentally responsible mines’’ in Congo and surrounding countries.

The meeting will be hosted by Cabot Corp., a Boston company that is one of the world’s leading producers of tantalum products.

Andrew O’Donovan, general manager of Cabot’s supermetals division, said the industry coalition is trying to eliminate conflict minerals from the supply chain without freezing out legitimate suppliers in the region.

There are some legitimate mining operations in Congo that are “just trying to make a living like the rest of us,’’ said O’Donovan. But “today there is no system in place to determine the good from the bad,’’ he said.

Cabot officials say they do not get any tantalum from Congo, and have no plans to. The company also avoids tantalum from the Republic of Congo, Zambia, Burundi, and Rwanda.

O’Donovan estimates that the Democratic Republic of Congo supplies 10 percent to 15 percent of the world’s tantalum. “It’s hard to know what they supply, because so much leaks out,’’ he said.

Congolese minerals are two to three times cheaper than those mined in other countries, according to Donovan. That’s partly because large quantities of columbite-tantalite (a source of tantalum) can be found close to the surface of the earth in that region of Africa. Also, the lack of regulation and enforcement, combined with the nation’s poverty-stricken population, make labor cheap.

Since 2002, when the UN released an early report on the illicit trade of Congolese minerals, Cabot officials said they have repeatedly reminded customers and investors that they get tantalum from mines in Canada, Australia, and Mozambique. But none of those mines are now operating. Cabot recently suspended its mining operation in Canada, and the company that owns the mine in Mozambique did the same. In Australia, Talison Minerals ceased its mining operations (which supplied 30 percent of the world’s tantalum) in December 2008.

The recent mine closings will not affect Cabot’s operations, according to Susannah Robinson, director of Cabot’s investor relations, because the company has a large stockpile on hand.

“We have an adequate supply [of tantalum] to meet our needs,’’ she said.

Last year, the Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition and the Global e-Sustainability Initiative commissioned Resolve Inc., a nonprofit based in Washington, to map the supply chain for tin, tantalum, and cobalt (a mineral used in batteries and magnetic recording media). The group only managed to trace one particular cobalt supply chain from start to finish, according to Resolve’s president, Steve D’Esposito.

Such efforts are a good start to addressing the trade of conflict minerals, said Sullivan, the researcher with the Enough Project. “You look at the last year, and much more has happened over the past year than the last nine years,’’ he said.

Still, Sullivan is concerned about the recent mine closings, and worries it could lead to the another “coltan rush,’’ like the one that took place in Congo a decade ago.

Consumer pressure, as well as increased commitment from companies, will be key to solving the problem, according to Sullivan.

“Companies are starting to look into their supply chains,’’ he said, “but we’d like them to do it with more urgency and resources.’’

Emily Sweeney can be reached at esweeney@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @emilysweeney.

© Copyright 2010 Globe Newspaper Company.

Rwanda joins Commonwealth

2010-03-13T23:01:00.003Z

President Kagame was in London this week as Rwanda took the latest step in its development journey as its flag was officially raised alongside those of 54 other Commonwealth nations. The move is hailed by Rwandans as an example of their openness to the world and determination to play a full role in the global community.

Full story: Tony Blair sends congratulations as Rwanda formally joins Commonwealth Thursday, Mar 11, 2010.

UK Minister for Africa Baroness Kinnock makes inaugural visit to DR Congo

2010-02-24T13:10:00.007Z

Here are some photos of British government minister Baroness Kinnock on her first visit to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) as Minister for Africa.

During her visit Baroness Kinnock met with Prime Minister Muzito and other key ministers to discuss, amongst other issues, the upcoming elections in 2011.

The UK is one of the largest bilateral donors to the DRC, providing support for stabilisation in the East as well as for governance, elections and police reform.

Photo: Minister for Africa makes inaugural visit to DRC (Photo credit: UK FCO)

Photo: Visit to DR Congo (Photo credit: UK FCO)

Photo: Muslim community in DRC (Photo credit: UK FCO)

Photo: Women activists in DRC (Photo credit: UK FCO)

Minister for Africa makes inaugural visit to DRC
From UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO), Tuesday, 23 February 2010:

Baroness Kinnock makes her first visit to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) as Minister for Africa.

Baroness Kinnock, FCO minister with responsibility for Africa, visited Kinshasa and South Kivu as part of a wider visit to the region.

During her visit Baroness Kinnock met with Prime Minister Muzito and other key ministers to discuss, amongst other issues, the upcoming elections in 2011.

Baroness Kinnock also visited a Muslim community NGO, COMICO, which focuses on capacity building for Muslim women in the DRC. This was followed by a roundtable discussion with a number of MPs and NGOs focusing on women's rights.

Speaking during her visit, Baroness Kinnock said:

'The women in the eastern region of Congo have suffered the most terrible sexual abuse and violence and they suffer from terrible psychological trauma as well as physical problems of unimaginable kind. They need to feel that there’s some justice, that there is some way of dealing with the perpetrators of that violence, and those are the kind of issues that we need to keep raising. We need to see reform of many aspects of the institutions in Congo and I think whatever efforts we can make to support them, alongside the European Union, the United Nations and others, then we’re really up for doing that.'

The Minister was hosted by the British Embassy in Kinshasa, which won ‘Team of the Year’ at the UK Civil Service Awards in 2008 for its joined up approach with the Department for International Development and the Ministry of Defence.

Later in the week, the Minister will travel to the east of the country, where she will visit the UN Mission in the DRC (MONUC), a water and sanitation project and Panzi hospital, which specialises in treating victims of gender based violence.
Glenys Kinnock said:

'When I’m in eastern Congo I will be meeting with the army, both the Congolese army and the United Nations forces, and talking about how they intend to review the way that they see the process of moving forward in Congo.'

The UK is one of the largest bilateral donors to the DRC, providing support for stabilisation in the East as well as for governance, elections and police reform.

Further information

DRC Embassy website

Glenys Kinnock on BBC News (23 Feb 2010)

Glenys Kinnock on BBC World News (22 Feb 2010)

Lord Malloch-Brown, previous Minister for Africa, visited DRC in November 2008.

Coup attempt underway in Niger

2010-02-18T17:28:00.001Z

See reports at Niger Watch, Thursday, 18 February 2010.

UK gov't job vacancy: A2 Statistics Adviser based within World Bank Nairobi Country Office, Kenya

2010-02-06T18:39:00.000Z

Seen on twitter:

RT with correct link #DFIDjobs New vacancy: Statistics Adviser, Kenya. Apply now: http://ow.ly/12ExI Closing date: 27 Feb
6:29 AM Feb 5th from HootSuite
dfid_uk

Based within the World Bank Nairobi Country Office, you will support the KNBS reform process, the design/implementation of the next KNBS strategic plan, and lead the sector's donor co-ordination. The closing date for applications is 27 February 2010. LAST UPDATED: 28 JAN 2010. Click here for specific vacancy information [PDF - 88 KB] and apply online.

Back to Africa: A new Haitian homeland?

2010-02-02T18:50:00.003Z

If a proposal under consideration by the African Union this week were to bear fruit, Haitians made homeless by the earthquake could start afresh in a new homeland in Africa.

From The Independent (UK)
By Leo Hornak
Monday, 1 February 2010
Back to Africa: A new Haitian homeland?

African Union (AU) President Jean Ping yesterday announced that the idea of resettling displaced Haitians in Africa would be part of the AU's formal agenda during its annual summit this week. According to Mr Ping, Haiti's history as a creation of the slave trade and the world's first black republic creates a special obligation for African Union members.

"It is out of a sense of duty and memory and solidarity that we can further the proposal ... to create in Africa the conditions for the return of Haitians," said Mr Ping. The idea of a new Haitian homeland in Africa was originally suggested by Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade last month, and now appears to be gathering momentum. As a first step, Mr Wade has asked African governments to naturalise any Haitians who wish to emigrate to their country, and to encourage African families to adopt Haitian children orphaned in the earthquake.

It would not be the first time that a new African state has been created to house the descendants of slaves from the new world. In 1847, the American Colonisation Society, an unlikely coalition of abolitionists and slave owners, created Liberia with the same aim in mind. Thousands of former slaves and their descendants eventually made the journey from the US to west Africa. Little care was taken to protect the rights of the tribes already living in the territory, however, and Liberian society has been divided between settler and indigenous communities ever since – indigenous Liberians were only given the vote in 1963.

Mr Wade has also referred to the Middle East as a model for his Haitian project. Speaking to Euronews last week he said: "It's not asking too much to transplant those who want it. Israel was desert. Palestine was desert. People were transplanted who today are building a country."

The resettlement idea also raises questions about whether many African countries have the resources to support a large influx of impoverished Haitian refugees, or would be willing to give up territory for a new state. Senegal has some points of cultural contact with Haiti, but it is far from wealthy. In 2009, Senegal was rated 166 out of 177 on the UN's Human Development Index. Haiti was 17 places higher at 149.

Click on label here below for related news.

DR Congo & Rwanda - Land disputes at the root of African wars

2010-01-30T22:32:00.008Z

Land disputes at the root of African wars

A selection of the African continent's fights over land that have turned into violent, conflict, or threaten to.

From The Christian Science Monitor
By Jina Moore Correspondent, 30 January 2010

Land battles that sparked African conflicts

Western Sudan (Darfur) In the 1970s, the government eliminated the country's native administration – a quasi-government and colonial holdover of traditional elders – and rejected traditional land rights, depriving Darfur's pastoralists of access to grazing lands. When famine exacerbated disputes about land in the 1980s, violence broke out. Land grievances were never resolved, and in 2003, a rebel movement made up in part of disenfranchised former landholders revolted against the Sudanese government, which retaliated by arming bands of camel herders known as janjaweed to repress the rebellion – and promising them hefty tracts of the land, emptied in the course of the violence the militia unleashed.

The Democratic Republic of Congo Often called Africa's most deadly conflict, violence in parts of the northeast started over grazing cows in1999, when Hema herders evicted Lendu farmers after purchasing their land. Eviction grievances led both tribes to pick up weapons. As violence spread, the value of other mineral-rich lands contributed to the chaos in which 5 million people have died.

Ethiopia and Eritrea A 1998 dispute over the dusty border town of Badme turned into all-out war, with 80,000 deaths in two years. The town became the flash point of an older argument over the border between the two countries. Both sides saw Badme as a symbol of their real economic concern: power over the port of Assab, the Red Sea trade gateway. Despite international court rulings, the countries consider the border dispute unresolved – and their presidents often rally support by threatening to resume the fight.

Kenya Many indigenous tribes lost rights to traditional lands when the British privatized land holdings. When Joseph Kenyatta, the first postcolonial president, sought land redistribution, he gave the most fertile to his Kikuyu tribe. In a later backlash, many Kikuyu were pushed off their pastures. This created ethnic land grievances that have inspired violence during Kenya's elections since the 1990s, most recently after President Mwai Kabaki, a Kikuyu, was accused of stuffing ballot boxes in 2007.

Rwanda The 1994 genocide may have been catalyzed as much by land scarcity as by ethnic tension. Africa's most densely populated country found itself nearly without enough land to make farmers trust that they and their children could support themselves. Though the slaughter of minority Tutsis was also ethnically motivated, land fears played no small part in the violence.

Zimbabwe Land grievances helped fuel the 12-year war that led to independence in 1979. But recent violence stems from land reform efforts. In the name of economic fairness, President Robert Mugabe seized white farms and turned them over to blacks, primarily government officials who knew little about farming. As a result, agricultural production plummeted, food became scarce, and inflation spiked. Mugabe held power in a 2008 election only with violent intimidation of Zimbabweans.

Combustible land disputes that could erupt in conflict

Burundi The past decade brought the return of more than a half-million refugees who'd fled violence that began with independence in 1963. Many found their homes occupied – and because laws give ownership to anyone who has peacefully occupied land for at least 30 years, many refugees lost their homes and livelihoods. Experts fear the grievance could spark renewed conflict.

South Africa At the 1994 transition to democracy, the government planned to redistribute 30 percent of white-owned farms to blacks within 20 years. Transfers are behind schedule, and more than half have failed. After an outbreak of racial violence last year, observers fear the status quo – with expectations so high, progress so slow, and livelihoods at stake – is combustible.

Southern Sudan The 2005 peace agreement that ended a 20-year fight for the south didn't resolve tensions between the nation's two land systems. Private property reform implemented in the north was rejected in the south, which continues to use traditional rules. Danger of a potential clash between parallel systems is amplified by what's at stake: The south is oil-rich.

Uganda After 20 years of violence in the north, peace is bringing people home – and disputes are erupting over who owns property. Eighty percent of Ugandans have property claims based on the traditional land system, but a generation of conflict has weakened the traditional authority, of elders to resolve disputes or enforce land rules. As the government steps in to fill the power vacuum, experts fear a backlash.

Zambia White farmers forced off land in neighboring countries, found fertile soils here, and were initially welcomed by the government (five years ago). The tone changed as some immigrant farmers agitated locals by putting down roots on traditional lands. New arrivals, especially those fleeing Zimbabwe, are closely scrutinized. Observers fear deepening tensions.

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Paul Kagame speaks to This is Africa about Rwanda’s remarkable success story

2010-01-28T21:19:00.003Z

From The Office of Tony Blair
Wednesday, January 27, 2010

The following interview with President Paul Kagame of Rwanda appeared in the latest edition of This is Africa.

“A lot is changing. The voices of Africa are becoming more pronounced. There is insistence on Africa being taken seriously by Africans themselves, and Africans are trying to assert themselves and not only say the right things but also be seen to be doing the right things”

International capital investment will be vital for African development, but governance reform should be indigenously driven and not imposed by external actors, says Rwandan president Paul Kagame.

Mr Kagame, a softly-spoken former soldier, assumed power in 2000 and since then has overseen one of Africa’s – if not the world’s – most compelling stories of economic growth. Since the turn of the millennium, Rwanda’s GDP growth has averaged more than 7 percent per year. In the past five years the rate of that growth had been increasing, hitting a high of 11.2 percent in 2008, until the effects of the global economic downturn began to impact on the country, curtailing growth to 5.3 percent in 2009.

Underpinning this growth have been sustained private sector reforms that have attracted inward investment into agriculture and telecommunications. The World Bank’s 2010 “Doing Business” report, which tracks global business regulation, put Rwanda at the top of the reform table, stating that Kigali had lowered more barriers to investment than anywhere else in the world. It is this success that has elevated Mr Kagame to a platform from which he has been able to broadcast his message of self-determination with confidence and credibility. Aid, he has prescribed, is not working in its current form. It is through investment that the continent will develop, and the reform process that its governments undergo must be pushed by domestic factors, not by conditionality imposed by donors.

He acknowledges that the gulf between the perception of the continent and the reality on the ground is a massive challenge in terms of courting this investment. Rwanda perhaps suffers more than anywhere else in this regard. In 1994 the country was torn apart by a genocide that left hundreds of thousands of civilians dead and whose aftershocks still contribute to ethnic tensions and instability in the region. The tragedy also imprinted on the Western consciousness an image of suffering that still endures 15 years later. Bridging that gap is, to some extent, a domestic issue, he says, “But it’s also the task for those from outside to pick up the right signals and to change their own perceptions about Africa, and also about the kind of relationship that has to exist between Africa and the rest of the world.”

In a Financial Times article in May 2009, Mr Kagame condemned the “sentimentality” of the G20 and other multilaterals in their discussions on Africa, as well as the prevalence of the donor-recipient model in international relations with the continent. However, that relationship is already maturing, he says. “I think a lot is changing. The voices of Africa are becoming more pronounced. There is insistence on Africa being taken seriously by Africans themselves, and Africans are trying to assert themselves and not only say the right things but also be seen to be doing the right things,” he says. “I also see the emergence of a new approach and attitude from outside of Africa from the rest of the world. There are certain realities that people are learning from… people are discovering that on their side there are a lot of things they need to do, for their own benefit and for their own countries, in Europe or America.”

This understanding of mutual self-interest is increasingly significant not only between the continent and its international partners, Mr Kagame says. The growing potency of the African Union and regional economic bodies, as well as their apparent willingness to step in to resolve disputes, is an encouraging sign. Mr Kagame’s Rwanda has made steps towards reconciliation with the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo. Kigali’s role in the region’s conflicts since the end of the genocide has been much criticised, but the past 12 months have seen an unprecedented degree of cooperation between the two nations. Diplomatic sources in Kinshasa say that there is a strong sense of buy-in from both sides of the border, which suggests that progress is being made on one of Africa’s most intractable areas of conflict.

Mr Kagame sees this as symptomatic of the growing understanding amongst leaders and civilians that they have an individual stake in regional stability. “We are working together at government level and we are also encouraging business to happen across borders. I think the people of Congo are beginning to realise that indeed they benefit more by working with people beyond their borders, rather than keeping their problems to themselves or blaming their problems on outside [influences].”

The thoughtfully controversial stance on aid perhaps demonstrates the kind of interlocutor that Mr Kagame wants to become on the world stage: conciliatory in his willingness to take responsibility for regional problems, but similarly unafraid to pick up on what he sees as hypocrisy in Western discourse. However, he seemed to break this façade recently in his public comments on Chinese investment into Africa. In an interview with Handelsblatt, the German newspaper, Mr Kagame was quoted as saying that China’s involvement was almost overwhelmingly positive, and stood in stark contrast to Western efforts.

Today, Mr Kagame insists that his support was not as unequivocal as has been reported, and he appears genuinely disappointed that the more nuanced message he favours has not come through. Instead, the comments have been built into a far less maturely argued controversy, with the president being cast as an apologist for China. The recurrent criticisms of China’s human rights record and the notion that its lack of conditionality fuel governance failures in Africa were revived. Why, one accusation went, should Mr Kagame accept investments from China while China invests in Guinea and Guinea is in political turmoil following a coup d’etat?

Notwithstanding the difficulty of establishing a causal link between Guinea’s troubles and China’s investment, Mr Kagame suggests there is an inherent hypocrisy in the suggestion that there is a choice between two opposing and mutually exclusive poles, whose approach is characterised by equally divergent views on governance and democracy.

“If that point was being taken seriously, China shouldn’t be allowed to invest in the West… or the West should not be investing in China because China is doing wrong things in Guinea,” he says with a faint smile. “My argument on this has been not to judge China or judge the West. I want to focus on Africa itself, so that we avoid seeing Africa as not a viable or effective player in world affairs, and only to be seen either as a victim or a beneficiary caught up between other players.”

Africa, he insists, should not be the subordinate partner in African affairs. The debate over China’s disinterested approach to governance, particularly where it focuses on the perceived likelihood that African leaders’ ability to reform will be undermined as a result, is “very patronising,” he says.

Likewise, that reform should not be imposed upon Africa. “We’ve seen China invest in Africa in areas that are key to Africa. My concern is: how are Africans prepared to make good use of these investments for their development, by China or anyone else,” he says. “My thinking is not to blame China for this, or the West for this. I want to start blaming [African countries] for not being … prepared to do their part and to benefit themselves and to benefit those who invest in them.

“What questions should China, or any country in the West be asking [when they invest]? The number one question they should be asking is: does it bring good returns for the investments that they are making? Now, if there are issues about governance and politics, they are free to ask these questions. But tying everything to these questions that have been asked for the last 50 years I think borders on, or even goes beyond, hypocrisy and double standards.”

Mr Kagame’s message of investment over aid and profit over sentimentality does seem to be resonating with the private sector, and his vision of a new narrative for Rwanda – and Africa as a whole – has proved compelling to many in the development community. Others, however, insist that economic reform does not translate into social reform, and that democracy and human rights remain off the table. Mr Kagame’s response is far more Washington consensus than Beijing.

“These investments also encourage positive developments, with more prosperity, with more wealth and more employment and more infrastructure and so on. Africa will develop and will take more control of its destiny, and governments will allow or even be pressured into allowing more freedom, more choices, good governance and democracy,” he says.

Further reading
Africa Governance Initiative

"A Prosperous and Exciting Africa in Our Lifetime" Tony Blair talks to African Investor magazine

2010-01-22T13:40:00.003Z

Former UK prime minister Tony Blair has the utmost faith that Africa will succeed, something the continent needs from investors and advisors. His ultimate vision for Africa is to see the continent achieve its own goals. "It's up to Africa and its leaders. I believe that we will see a prosperous and exciting Africa in our lifetime and we are approaching a point where the business community is waking up to the opportunities of Africa at a time when Africa has this new generation of leaders."

Source: "A Prosperous and Exciting Africa in Our Lifetime" Tony Blair talks to African Investor magazine
The Office of Tony Blair, Wednesday, Jan 20, 2010:

The following interview appeared in the January-February 2010 edition of African Investor magazine

"Africa has been at the top of my foreign policy for the last ten years," says Tony Blair, former UK prime minister. "From the very beginning I wanted to forge a new partnership with African leaders and countries. I really believe that Africa is the next big opportunity for investors, it would not only be good for business but could transform the lives of Africans."

Blair is now involved in supporting the continent through The Office of Tony Blair. He has established several other foundations, including The Africa Governance Initiative, to encourage governments across the continent to develop strong regulation to encourage investment in a clutch of African countries - Sierra Leone, Rwanda and now Liberia - and drive development.

"I firmly believe that, in the long-term, good governance and sustained economic growth are the key to poverty eradication. This is the basis of the African Governance Initiative that I set up 18 months ago," says Blair.

"We work with African countries who are serious about standing on their own two feet by growing their private sector and making government work more effectively," says Blair, with the aim of motivating African governments to be independent thinkers.

Blair has been developing his interest in Africa for a long time. He drew criticism for his emotive turn of phrase in calling Africa "a scar on the conscience of the world", accused of shoring up a negative image that Africa was unable to act for itself. At the time of the Commission for Africa, an organisation established to bring to light the core issues affecting the continent, Blair said: "I fear my own conscience on Africa. I fear the judgement of future generations, where history properly calculates the gravity of the suffering. I fear them asking: but how could wealthy people, so aware of such suffering, so capable of acting, simply turn away to busy themselves with other things?"

Now he supports countries he believes are getting on and up for themselves.

Ernest Bai Koroma, President of Sierra Leone, says his government has taken great steps towards driving economic growth in the country. "The IMF has predicted that we will grow at twice the African average by the end of this year (2009)," he said. "But this is only the beginning; our country has a wealth of untapped potential. We are building a legislative framework that provides the right incentives for investors while ensuring that all feel the benefits of economic growth," says Koroma.

The Sierra Leone Trade and Investment Forum held in late November 2009 was attended by Blair and roused great enthusiasm for investing in the country.

"Sierra Leone has significant, unrealised potential and is open for business and investment," said George Soros, international business mogul, in a televised address. "If you look carefully at the real Sierra Leone, it is clear that the country has the genuine potential to become a leading African economy."

Although Blair gives money freely, he says "all African countries should aim to be in a place where they do not need development assistance.

"President Kagame of Rwanda and President Koroma in Sierra Leone, who I work closely with, are just two examples of a new generation of pro-business, pro-reform leaders from Africa who are serious about rooting out corruption, providing protection for investors and leading more stable, better-governed countries," he says.

"I have been through similar challenges to the presidents I work with, albeit in a very different national and regional context. You sometimes need the experience of someone who has sat on ‘the other side of the desk'."

Blair has the utmost faith that Africa will succeed, something the continent needs from investors and advisors. His ultimate vision for Africa is to see the continent achieve its own goals. "It's up to Africa and its leaders. I believe that we will see a prosperous and exciting Africa in our lifetime and we are approaching a point where the business community is waking up to the opportunities of Africa at a time when Africa has this new generation of leaders."

Rwandan genocide suspect Sosthene Munyemana arrested in France

2010-01-21T09:14:00.005Z

The arrest comes weeks after French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner made his first visit to Rwanda since diplomatic ties were restored in November. See reports here below.

Doctor wanted in Rwanda in genocide detained
From Associated Press via Taiwan News on Thursday, 21 January 2010:

Bordeaux police say they have detained a Rwandan doctor wanted by his homeland for allegedly playing a part in the 1994 genocide.

Sosthene Munyemana, who works as an emergency doctor, was freed under judicial control, meaning he must report to judicial officials until his appearance before a court that will decide his fate.

France rejected his asylum demand in 2008 and detained him Wednesday on an international arrest warrant. Rwanda wants the doctor extradited for his alleged role in the genocide.

Munyemana says he is innocent and has appealed the asylum decision.

An estimated 500,000 people, mostly ethnic Tutsis, were massacred in 100 days of frenzied killing led by radical Hutus.

Rwandan genocide suspect arrested in France
From BBC News at 07:51 GMT, Thursday, 21 January 2010:

A Rwandan doctor wanted on charges of genocide and war crimes has been arrested in France, police say.

Sosthene Munyemana, 45, who had been working in a hospital in Bordeaux for eight years, denies the charges.

His arrest on an extradition warrant from Rwanda comes weeks after France and Rwanda restored diplomatic ties.

France had rejected an asylum bid by him in 2008, saying there were "serious reasons" to suspect his involvement in war crimes in 1994, AFP reported.

Some 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed in the 100-day massacre in 1994.

Mr Munyemana was released on bail, but must report to judicial officials until a court date is set.

He had been on the Interpol list of wanted men for a few years.

Shooting down

The arrest comes weeks after French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner made his first visit to Rwanda since diplomatic ties were restored in November.

Relations between Paris and Kigali had been poor for several years but were severed in 2006 after a French judge accused President Paul Kagame and several senior officials of being behind the 1994 murder of Rwanda's Hutu President Juvenal Habyaremana.

The shooting down of his plane triggered the 1994 genocide.

Those suspected of being most responsible for the killings are being tried by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) based in Arusha, Tanzania.

Rwanda: 'Butcher of Tumba' Arrested, Released On Bail AllAfrica.com

Rwandan genocide suspect arrested in France AFP

Doctor wanted in Rwanda in genocide detained eTaiwan News

all 5 news articles »

Le médecin rwandais entendu à Bordeaux Sud Ouest

Un médecin rwandais soupçonné de génocide interpellé à Bordeaux nouvelobs.com

Le génocidaire présumé enfin arrêté 20minutes.fr

Le Figaro - Le Progrès

all 20 news articles »

DR Congo offers help to Haitians - Senegal offers free land to any Haitians who want to "return" to Africa

2010-01-19T09:25:00.007Z

On Sunday, Senegal's President Abdoulaye Wade said he was offering free land to any Haitians who wanted to "return" to Africa.

"The president is offering voluntary repatriation to any Haitian that wants to return to their origin," said Mr Wade's spokesman, Mamadou Bemba Ndiaye.

Responding to the Senegalese offer, Mr Mende said the government would certainly not reject any Haitians if they wanted to move to DR Congo.

SOURCE: BBC News online at 17:39 GMT UK, Monday, 18 January 2010 - Poor DR Congo offers aid to Haiti. Here is a copy, in full:

The Democratic Republic of Congo has announced it is sending $2.5m (£1.5m) in emergency aid to Haiti, to help it cope with last week's earthquake.

Some Congolese have criticised the offer. After years of conflict, which is still raging in the east, millions of people live in poverty.

The country depends on foreign aid and civil servants frequently go unpaid.

But Information Minister Lambert Mende told the BBC that DR Congo would contribute within its means.

"Congo isn't bankrupt, our own problems shouldn't prevent us from helping a brother country," he said.

But political scientist Ntanda Nkere from the University of Kinshasa told the BBC:

"It's a contradiction to see a country which is facing serious financial problems giving away $2.5m but at the same time, it's a purely diplomatic reaction, the Congolese government wants to appear like any other government."

On Sunday, Senegal's President Abdoulaye Wade said he was offering free land to any Haitians who wanted to "return" to Africa.

Most of Haiti's population are descended from slaves.

"The president is offering voluntary repatriation to any Haitian that wants to return to their origin," said Mr Wade's spokesman, Mamadou Bemba Ndiaye.

Responding to the Senegalese offer, Mr Mende said the government would certainly not reject any Haitians if they wanted to move to DR Congo.

The earthquake killed tens of thousands in Haiti, with many bodies still stuck in the remains of buildings.

Aid is slowly arriving but aid workers are struggling to distribute it to all those who need it.

I hope the whole world helps Haiti. See comments online at BBC's Have Your Say: Should Africa help Haiti? Here is a copy of some heartwarming comments posted:

Monday, 18 January, 2010, 18:49 GMT 18:49 UK
First I would like to thank you to African leaders that tried to help our brothers and sister in Haiti. This is a time we have to show the world that we are able to help our with a lettle that we have. I will say long live to our African leaders. Haitian people were our people before the end in that island. This is time for them to come. Second, I thank world leaders that put their hands to help Haiti. Specaily, United States leaders. Haitian history is our everyone that why they are in Haiti.
Simon, NJ, US Original From South Sudan
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It does not matter who helps them.
JUST HELP THEM !!
Haiti, as a country, have never harmed anyone.
Please everyone come together and help them.
Gareth, UK
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Added: Tuesday, 19 January, 2010, 08:46 GMT 08:46 UK
The Senegal president's offer is a good one. Haitians should explore living in Africa especially if conditions in their state are, relatively, not as favourable. There is good abundant farmland and opportunity for those with skills to live better in Africa. Infact, i would propose Haitians obtain African citizenship and join the African Union
Ezekiel Pombe, Kisumu
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Added: Tuesday, 19 January, 2010, 02:10 GMT 02:10 UK
yes! everywhere should help haiti!! they are in desperate need of help!
me, vegas
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Added: Monday, 18 January, 2010, 22:56 GMT 22:56 UK
May God bless President President Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal,
Macaulay Akinbami, Lagos-Nigeria
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Added: Monday, 18 January, 2010, 20:20 GMT 20:20 UK
The Senegalese govt's thinking and offer is really very encouraging i enjoin other African's country to offer same olive branch and hopefully the Haitians are considering this
olaosebikan o.k (mrs), Lagos
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France: Cote d’Ivoire - Tournée africaine de Bernard Kouchner

2010-01-18T17:49:00.006Z

Cote d’Ivoire / Tournée africaine de Bernard Kouchner
Copy of report, in full.
Source: France – Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

(PARIS, France) 18 janvier 2010/African Press Organization (APO)/
— Actualités diplomatiques du ministère français des Affaires étrangères / Point de presse du 18 janvier 2010. (…)

(Une information de presse fait état de la présence de Claude Guéant à Abidjan le week-end dernier, alors que Bernard Kouchner a dû annuler le 10 janvier l’étape ivoirienne de sa tournée africaine. Y a-t-il une différence d’approche entre la présidence de la République et le ministère des Affaires étrangères et européennes au sujet de la Côte d’Ivoire ?)

Comme nous l’avions indiqué, Bernard Kouchner a décidé d’annuler l’étape ivoirienne de son récent déplacement en Afrique, en raison de l’annonce par les autorités ivoiriennes du report de la publication des listes électorales consolidées. Aucune visite officielle de haut niveau n’est prévue en Côte d’Ivoire prochainement. Comme vous avez pu le constater, le secrétaire général de l’Elysée était l’invité hier d’Europe 1. La coordination entre l’Elysée et le Quai d’Orsay est totale et particulièrement vigilante sur le dossier de la Côte d’Ivoire./.

Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)
Attentat au Caire (22 février 2009) / Communiqué de Bernard Kouchner

Pass this on: Missing Persons Registry - Haitian Earthquake January 2010

2010-01-14T14:02:00.001Z

Copy of message today on Twitter from Ushahidi's Erik Hersman:

Pass this on. Missing persons registry for #haiti is http://www.haitianquake.com
about 4 hours ago from twhirl
ushahidi

Further reading

Patrick Meier's report at Ushahidi's blog, 13 January 2010: Our Efforts in Response to Haiti’s Earthquake - We’ve launched Haiti.Ushahidi.com

Ethan Zuckerman's blog post at My Heart's in Accra, 13 January 2010: Following the Haitian earthquake online

World Bank: Republic of Congo & DR Congo eligible to participate in initial $26.2m phase of CAB program to develop high-speed telecoms

2010-01-12T10:50:00.002Z

$215 Million Central Africa Backbone Program (CAB Program) Will Bring Low Cost, High Speed Internet to the Region. Program is expected to bring significant development impact.

Source: World Bank Press Release No:2010/094.SDN
Contact
In Geneva: Ian Larsen
Phone: +41(0)79 477 96 17
E-mail: ilarsen@worldbank.org or ianlarsen71@yahoo.com

GENEVA, October 6, 2009 – Today the Executive Board of Directors of the World Bank Group has announced its endorsement of the $215 million, ten-year Central African Backbone Program (CAB Program). This program will support the countries of the Central African region in developing their high-speed telecommunications backbone infrastructure to increase the availability of high-speed Internet and reduce end-user prices. The CAB Program will also help countries harmonize the laws and regulations that govern the ICT sector to increase private sector investment and improve competition.

Three countries – Cameroon, Chad and Central African Republic (CAR) – are participating in the initial $26.2 million phase of the Program. A further eight countries are also eligible to participate in the Program—Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Niger, Nigeria, São Tomé and Principe, and Sudan.

The CAB Program is being supported through a partnership between the World Bank Group and the African Development Bank (AfDB). The program also aims to leverage an additional US$98 million from the private sector. In conjunction with the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa (CEMAC), the African Union Commission (AUC) will play an important role in facilitating inter-governmental cooperation and policy harmonization. The International Finance Corporation (IFC) will also assist governments in structuring Public Private Partnerships under the program.

Development Impact

The CAB Program brings much needed connectivity to Central Africa. Until now, people in Central Africa have the lowest quality and highest cost Internet and telephone services in Africa. The population pays up to two times more in monthly Internet rates than people living in other African countries, and up to three times more than those living in other parts of the world. “The CAB Program is very important for the countries involved and lies at the heart of their development strategies. It will assist countries to strengthen their enabling environment, create competition and, ultimately increase access and lower the costs for end users,” said Mary Barton-Dock, World Bank Country Director for Cameroon, Chad and Central African Republic.

In its recent Information and Communications for Development 2009: Extending Reach and Increasing Impact, the World Bank found that for every 10 percentage-point increase in high speed Internet connections there is an increase in economic growth of 1.3 percentage points. The report also identifies the mobile platform as the single most powerful way to reach and deliver public and private services to hundreds of millions of people in remote and rural areas across the developing world.

“Ultimately, our goal is to develop regional and national broadband backbones and significantly reduce the cost of ICT services in Central Africa. Through better and affordable connectivity, the aim is to leverage the transformational powers of ICTs to support economic growth, SME development, employment creation, productivity gains and trade integration in the region,” says Mohsen Khalil, Director of Global Information and Communications Technologies at the World Bank Group.

Modernizing the ICT Sector

In addition to infrastructure development, the CAB Program will strengthen the capacity of public institutions such as the sectoral ministries and regulatory authorities and will promote a competition-friendly environment by liberalizing the sector and restructuring telecommunications operators.

The Program is also meant to be a model of regional integration and successful public-private partnerships. Its design and implementation require the cooperation of several countries and international and regional organizations. Design goals will be to: (i) maximize the use of private financing (or minimize the use of public financing); (ii) ensure feasibility and attractiveness of the transaction; and (iii) secure open access to regional connectivity infrastructure and ensure competitive, reasonable tariff of international, regional and national capacity.

“This program is a great example of the World Bank’s increasing emphasis on regional infrastructure as part of Africa’s development,” said Rick Scobey, Acting Director for Regional Integration in Africa at the World Bank.

Part of a Broader Regional Strategy

The World Bank Group and African Development Bank (AfDB), in partnership, are committing significant resources and are making progress on the ground in helping to achieve the goals outlined at the October 2007 Connect Africa Summit. The Summit was convened by the International Telecommunications Union, the World Bank, the African Development Bank, the African Union, and the United Nations Global Alliance for ICT and Development.

This partnership has already launched three major regional connectivity programs, among a range of other ICT activities, with a fourth in the pipeline.

Regional Communications Infrastructure Program (RCIP)

The World Bank is providing US$424 million in financing for the Regional Communications Infrastructure Program (RCIP) to support regional connectivity and transparency in government through the use of ICT. The Program is available to all countries in the East and Southern Africa region and can be tailored to each country’s specific needs and priorities. The first phase of RCIP included Kenya, Madagascar and Burundi and was approved by the Board of the World Bank in 2007. The second phase was for Rwanda and was approved in 2008. The third phase includes Tanzania, Mozambique and Malawi and was approved by the Board of the World Bank in June 2009.

East African Submarine Cable System (EASSy) – World Bank Group, AfDB and other Development Finance Institutions (DFIs)

EASSy is a 10,000 km submarine fiber-optic cable running along the East Coast of Africa from Sudan to South Africa. It will directly connect eight of the countries along the route and indirectly connect all of the others in the region to the international communications infrastructure. It will provide broadband connectivity to the global fiber-optic cable networks, supplying low-cost, high bandwidth capacity to the markets in the region.

The project was developed by a consortium of 26 telecommunications operators, mostly from Eastern and Southern Africa with the support of five DFIs: International Finance Corporation (IFC), the AfDB, European Investment Bank, Agence Française de Développement (AFD) and Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW). The total cost of the project is $235 million with around $70 million coming as debt-financing from the DFIs. Of this, IFC contributed $32.7 million and AfDB contributed U$14.5 million.

EASSy is one of three submarine fiber-optic cables that are due to become operational in the region between 2009 and 2010. Experience shows that competition between submarine cables is the best way to achieve efficient and affordable ICT services.

West African Power Pool – Joint World Bank-AfDB

Limited inter-country connectivity in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) region results in inefficient, costly routing of calls between neighboring countries by satellite. Policy makers in the region have identified the emerging regional electricity transmission infrastructure as a way of improving high bandwidth regional communications capacity. These electricity networks have built in fiber-optic cables whose spare capacity can be utilized to provide backbone services to communications providers on a wholesale basis.

The World Bank and AfDB have been closely involved in developing the regional electricity transmission infrastructure through the West Africa Power Pool (WAPP). This transmission infrastructure will also be able to carry telecommunications traffic. In 2008, a stakeholder workshop in Benin endorsed the opportunity and committed to removing the bottlenecks associated with creating a regional backhaul network.

The World Bank and AfDB continue to provide support to the development of this network in FY09 through the preparation of the detailed technical, commercial and financial feasibility studies. Staff are also working with governments in the region to address the legal/regulatory and contractual arrangements for implementation, and continue to work with other donor agencies to ensure that efforts in this area are complementary.

“Regional communication infrastructure programs such as the CAB program illustrate what can be achieved through a strong partnership between the governments, private-sector and development partners,” said Yann Burtin, Project Manager for the CAB Program. The contributions of the AfDB and of the African Union Commission are essential to the process, added Burtin.

“The CAB program is an exciting development for Chad, Cameroon and the Central African Program. Regional connectivity projects like this one are increasingly important in the African Development Bank’s strategy for the region,” said Amadou Thierno Diallo, Manager for Energy and ICT at theAfDB.

For more information, please visit:
http://www.worldbank.org/gict

Cross-posted to Sudan Watch and Niger Watch.

Rwanda: Habyarimana killed by his own army, UK experts report

2010-01-11T16:15:00.003Z

Rwanda is this week expected to release the findings of an investigation by UK defence experts into the causes of the April 6, 1994 air crash that killed president Juvenal Habyarimana and his Burundian counterpart Cyprian Ntaryamira, triggering off a 100-day genocide in which nearly a million Rwandans, mainly Tutsi, died.

Click here for full story by The East African (Kenya), Monday, 11 January 2010 via Afrika.no - The Norwegian Council for Africa.

Africa Cup of Nations: Togo footballers shot on bus in Congo, near Angolan border

2010-01-08T17:53:00.012Z

Togo footballers shot in ambush
Report from BBC News at 17:44 GMT, Friday, 8 January 2010:

Gunmen have fired on a bus carrying Togo's football team to the Africa Cup of Nations in Angola, wounding several players, competition officials say.

They say robbers shot at the bus in Congo, near the Angolan border. There are reports of serious injuries.

The Africa Cup of Nations is due to start on Sunday.

Togo's first game is to be played on Monday in the oil-rich territory of Cabinda, where rebels have been fighting for independence.

The Togolese team includes Manchester City striker Emmanuel Adebayor and Aston Villa's Moustapha Saliphou.

Those wounded also include team doctors. The identities of the injured are not known.

The BBC understands Adebayor is not among them.

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Africa Cup of Nations: Venue guide

Four brand-new stadiums spread across Angola's west coast will give fans the chance to explore more than just on-field excitement at the Africa Cup of Nations. The BBC's Louise Redvers gives an insider's guide to the venues. Click here for full story at BBC News, Thursday, 7 January 2010.
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Africa Cup of Nations ready for kick-off

Africa Cup of Nations
Venue and dates: Angola, 10-31 January Coverage: Final and semi-finals live on BBC TV, BBC World Service and commentaries on BBC Sport website. Live commentary on opening match on BBC World Service and BBC Sport website. Click here for full story by Alistair Magowan, BBC News, Friday, 8 January 2010.

FDLR Inc: Congo’s multinational rebels, one of Africa's most feared militias

2010-01-06T10:36:00.003Z

The German authorities have arrested leaders of a militia which operates in the Democratic Republic of Congo - but how strong is the case against them? The BBC's East Africa Correspondent Peter Greste investigates.

The FDLR is one of Africa's most feared militias

From BBC News
By the BBC's East Africa Correspondent Peter Greste, 18 November 2009:
FDLR Inc: Congo’s multinational rebels

Over the past few months, I have been investigating connections between war crimes allegedly committed by the FDLR in the Congo, and their leaders living in Europe.

One of them is Callixte Mbarashimana, an unlikely-looking warlord, elegantly dressed in a suit, tie and overcoat. With his neatly trimmed goatee and easy smile, he looks more like a university professor than the second-most powerful man in one of Africa's most feared militias.

Mr Mbarashimana is the executive secretary of the FDLR - one of the most potent rebel forces fighting in the dense forests and bush-land along the eastern frontier of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

They are, he says, "a military-political organisation to protect Rwandan refugees and … to liberate the Rwandan people from the yoke of the fascist regime of the RPF (Rwandan Patriotic Front)".

'Conglomeration'

These are claims that gall human rights workers, the United Nations and countless Congolese civilians, who accuse the FDLR of a catalogue of abuses, including mass rape, murder, forced recruitments, child soldiers, using slaves to illegally exploit minerals.

"It's just a conglomeration of criminals," according to the head of the UN's programme to demobilise the region's armed groups, Greg Alex. "What have they done in the Congo that's been righteous?"

According to UN investigators, FDLR executives operate relatively freely in North America, and Europe. Those connections have infuriated peacekeeping officials in the Congo who have repeatedly called on host governments to dismantle the support structure that keeps the rebels fighting.

"The linkages are clear," said a frustrated Hiroute Guebre Sellassie, head of the UN's peacekeeping force in the province of North Kivu.

"The FDLR has remained cohesive as it is now because of the political leadership in Europe. These are people that encourage those in the field to kill, to rape every day. These are crimes, so they should be prosecuted."

'Commander-in-chief'

The FDLR's president, Ignace Murwanashyaka, lives in Mannheim in Germany. He was arrested on Tuesday, charged with being a leader of a terrorist organisation, of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

German authorities accuse Ignace Murwanashyaka of war crimes

In interview after interview, serving and former FDLR officials told me that he is not only the ideological and political force behind the movement, he is its supreme military commander.

He is "like President Obama," according to the FDLR's spokesman in the Congo who goes by the nom de guerre of "La Forge".

"Just as President Obama is also the commander-in-chief of the US armed forces, so President Murwanashyaka is our military leader as well."

The BBC has obtained a log of calls from satellite phones owned by senior FDLR commanders that shows a regular and consistent communication with leaders in the diaspora, notably Ignace Murwanashyaka.

The evidence - supported by testimony from former officers - suggests that he personally directed strategy and approved operations.

The UN estimates over a thousand civilians have been killed this year

Child soldiers

Captain Busokoye Donat is a former FDLR officer now in Rwanda under the demobilisation scheme. He used to be in charge of officer training before taking over what he described as "civil defence" - which is training civilian supporters in weapons and military tactics.

"You have to understand that in our organisation, Dr Murwanashyaka is like God," he said.

"He might not give tactical orders - that's the job of the officers who know the situation on the ground - but every operation is run past him for approval."

"He knows everything that happens in the field."

I asked Donat about reports that the FDLR is recruiting child soldiers.

"We have been losing a lot of troops through DDRRR (the UN's demobilisation programme) so we have to go to schools to get more soldiers. We have no choice," he said.

"Does Dr Murwanashyaka know this?" I asked.

"I told you. Dr Murwanashyaka knows everything that happens."

Donat also linked the leader to attacks on innocent villagers.

"I personally saw a telegram in which President Murwanashyaka told commanders that they should attack villages to force civilians to flee."

"That's to put pressure on the international community and Rwanda to negotiate with us," Donat said.

Justice

Before his arrest, we asked Mr Murwanashyaka for an interview. He referred us to his executive secretary Callixte Mbarashimana in Paris.

Callixte Mbarashimana defends the FDLR's human rights record

Mr Mbarashimana denied complicity in war crimes. "I am in a country where justice works. I am ready to face justice if there are any allegations that come with evidence."

"I have always claimed my innocence and I am ready - I repeat ready - to face justice if they come with allegations."

Mr Mbarashimana fiercely defended the FDLR's human rights record. "There is no FDLR policy to attack any civilian population," he said. "We condemn all those abuses. We have consistently called for an international investigation so that they can identify the authors of those abuses and bring them to justice. That is our policy."

The French authorities told me Mr Mbarashimana has broken none of their laws. They said free speech legislation protects his right to act as the organisation's spokesman, and they have not received any formal request for an investigation.

UNHCR: LRA killed 1,200 & abducted 1,400 in N.E. Congo Sep 2008 to Jun 2009 + killed 80 in 27 attacks in S. Sudan Dec 2008 - Mar 2009

2009-12-22T13:42:00.011Z

UN report details attacks on civilians
Report from Associated Press, December 22, 2009:

GENEVA - The United Nations accused the Uganda-based Lord’s Resistance Army yesterday of killing, mutilating, and raping villagers in Sudan and Congo in what may have been crimes against humanity.

The rebels killed at least 1,200 people and abducted 1,400 in northeastern Congo from September 2008 to June 2009, said a report by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.

A separate report by the UN’s rights office said that, in at least 27 attacks on villages in southern Sudan, the Lord’s Resistance Army killed more than 80 civilians and kidnapped many others to use as child soldiers, sex slaves, and spies. The report said the attacks in Sudan took place between December 2008 and March 2009.

Both reports were based on hundreds of interviews with survivors and several field trips to the remote areas by UN employees, said Rupert Colville, spokesman for the high commissioner.

Survivors in Sudan told UN investigators that armed Lord’s Resistance Army rebels arrived in groups of between five and 20 and attacked people with axes, bayonets, hoes, knives and machetes. They reserved the use of firearms for those who tried to flee, the report said.

The attacks in Sudan may amount to crimes against humanity, while the widespread abuses in Congo may have been war crimes as well, it said.