/ 31 March 2000

FRESH CLASHES IN DRC

FIGHTING in the northeast of the Democratic Republic of Congo between government security forces and a rebel faction claimed over 19 lives on Thursday, a rebel chief said. Jean-Pierre Bemba of the Congolese Liberation Movement, who heads one of three rebel groups fighting Kabila’s government, has denounced the attack as a “new violation of the ceasefire” agreed in Lusaka last year, but frequently flouted by all sides since then.