Almost 200 people were killed in a failed uprising in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo town of Kisangani in mid-May, United Nations Human Rights Commissioner Mary Robinson said Tuesday.
Robinson, presenting a report into the incident to the UN Security Council, said that UN peacekeepers in the area had done nothing to ”physically intervene,” despite calls from locals to stop the killings.
The violence, which left 183 people dead, according to the report, erupted after a Kisangani radio station called on the population to rise against the ”Rwandan invaders.”
She said it was part of the peacekeeping mission’s mandate to protect civilians from the ”imminent threat of physical violence” as stated in paragraph 7 of UN resolution 1417 (June 14, 2002).
”The situation in Kisangani is still volatile, and there is an immediate need to take preventative measures so that any further incidents of violence can be curtailed,” Robinson told the council.
”The Security Council should identify ways by which effective protection of civilians in the Democratic Republic of Congo can be provided,” she said.
It was the first time that a human rights commissioner has personally presented a report on a specific country to the Security Council.
Diplomatic sources said that around 600 UN soldiers are stationed at two airports in the Kisangani area, but are not equipped for day-to-day policing of the city.
The report, presented in a closed hearing and distributed to the press a few hours later, drew ”the firm conclusion that on 14 May 2002 the authorities of the Congolese Rally for Democracy-Goma (RCD-G) carried out summary executions and extrajudicial killings of civilians, soldiers and the police.”
The RCD-G is a Rwandan-backed rebel group which controls the eastern third of the Democratic Republic of Congo, including Kisangani.
”The RCD-G’s reprisals and crackdown were brutally calculated to collectively punish a population, including soldiers and police, with the intention of silencing their protests against RCD-G’s oppression and its alliance with Rwandan troops present in the area,” Robinson said. – AFP
