OWN CORRESPONDENT, Kigali | Monday 11.30pm.
THE rebels fighting to oust Democratic Republic of Congo President Laurent Kabila have requested international humanitarian organisations to help shift about 20,000 Tutsi Banyamulenge from south-eastern Katanga province.
Rebel-controlled radio Bukavu, monitored in Cyangugu across the border in Rwanda, said on Monday that the deputy governor of South Kivu, Benjamin Serukiza, held a meeting with local non-governmental and international organisations on Saturday.
“The displaced are survivors of massacres committed by the troops of Kabila that we are fighting,” Serukiza declared on the radio, adding that the operation was imminent.
The Banyamulenge — Congolese Tutsis — fled their villages in Kalemie and Moba districts as troops loyal to Kabila started a witch-hunt for Tutsis, the radio reported. Awakening echoes of the 1994 Rwandan genocide, when the revolt broke out against Kabila on August 2, the governor of Katanga province called on the population to massacre all Tutsis. Serukiza alleges that up to 1850 Banyamulenge were massacred in Katanga.
To relocate the displaced, the rebels have called on the assistance of France, Belgium, the United States, as well as the International Committee of the Red Cross, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, and the European Union.
A European NGO, Independent Source on Congo, however has reported that civilians in the east of the DRC are being subjected to abuses by both the rebels and pro-government militias — the Mai Mai and the Rwandan Hutu extremist Interhamwe, who carried out the 1994 Rwandan genocide in which up to a million Tutsis and modertae Hutus died.
According to SIC, rebel-occupied east has been isolated form the rest of the DRC and is suffering food shortages. Describing the result as “systematic plunder” the report said: “The entire stock of food and medicines of international humanitarian organisations whose foreign representatives left the region at the start [of the conflict] has been plundered by soldiers.” Armed bands also carry out daily attacks on private homes to steal money and household equipment.