British aid organisation Oxfam has called on the United Nations (UN) to deploy rapid reaction troops to enforce peace in Bunia, northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which has been rocked by violence between rival Hema and Lendu militias since the withdrawal of Ugandan troops.
“The UN Security Council must act on recommendations made to them by the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations. The Council must find troops and resources for a rapid reaction peace enforcement force for Bunia,” Nicola Reindorp, the head of Oxfam’s New York office, said on Saturday.
The Security Council is due to meet on Monday 12 May to decide on effective measures to stop the violence. News reports described a rising death toll among civilians at the weekend: they said 12 people, including three babies were killed in Bunia on Sunday, while some 20 civilians were killed in the town’s Nyakasunza parish compound on Saturday. Many humanitarian workers have left the town because of insecurity, and thousands of civilians have fled their homes.
“In Bunia today there is chaos and confusion and an atmosphere of total panic with the situation on the ground changing rapidly. There are fears that Bunia is on the edge of anarchy,” said Roy Maheshe, Oxfam’s policy adviser on the DRC.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan on Saturday expressed alarm at the deteriorating situation and said that the headquarters of the UN Mission to the DRC, Monuc, had been attacked on Friday by militias despite the fact that it was sheltering thousands of civilians.
“I am therefore asking the Security Council to consider effective measures to prevent the situation from deteriorating with further loss of civilian’s lives,” Annan said.
Monuc has nearly 700 mainly Uruguayan troops in Bunia. There is also a small contingent of Congolese police. Humanitarian organisations working in Bunia and the surrounding Ituri region warned that the withdrawal of Ugandan troops could create a power vacuum which would result in an upsurge of violence between militias from the Hema and Lendu communities.
The Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni on Sunday said that Congolese fleeing from Ituri were welcome in Uganda.
“It would be unacceptable for us to close our borders before them and leave them to be massacred,” he told a press conference in Kampala.
Museveni called for the deployment of an African Union (AU) force to the region.
“The situation in Ituri requires an African force with a proper mandate which should include monitoring a ceasefire if there is any, defending itself, defending civilians,” he said.
Museveni criticised the Monuc mission in Bunia, saying that the Monuc troops were practising “dangerous tourism”.
South African newspapers also reported on Sunday that South African president and AU chairperson Thabo Mbeki would urge Annan to give Monuc troops greater powers to intervene to protect civilians. – Irin