A dangerous humanitarian crisis is looming in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) with sharply increasing unrest in the Ituri region where nine United Nations soldiers were killed on Friday, the UN warned.
Observers say attempts to block the disarming of local rebels could jeopardise the transitional process designed to bring peace to the vast central African state after years of civil war claiming more than three million lives.
Nine soldiers of the UN mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (Monuc) died and 11 were wounded on Friday in the worst attack yet on the UN in DRC.
”In Ituri, there is violence everywhere,” said a UN official.
DRC Defence Minister Adolphe Onusumba said the killers would be brought to justice.
”The matter has been referred to the military justice authorities,” he said.
One political analyst said attacks on Ituri civilians had been ”part of a devastating process of fragmentation” of the traditional structures of rival local groups.
”It all looks like a last stand. They’re behaving as though they themselves were at great risk,” he said, stressing the dangers of the situation for the DRC political transition and democratisation process set to culminate in June with the country’s first free elections in 40 years after decades of tyranny and war.
In two months more than 70 000 refugees have fled atrocities by armed gangs.
The situation has deteriorated since a programme was launched last September to disarm 15 000 Ituri rebel militias.
By this month only about 3 300 had turned in their weapons, according to the UN mission.
Each militiaman must check in at a centre where he can either join regular government forces or return to civilian life.
But a UN official said government forces had instructed militia to keep their men mustered at assembly points, ”and we’ll come and get them straight away for the army”.
”That kind of message is wrecking the disarmament process for which the World Bank has given them $200-million,” the official warned.
”The situation is in danger of degenerating,” said a relief official.
Meanwhile, it was reported from the DRC capital Kinshasa that five militia leaders appointed as generals in the government armed forces had denied responsibility for the killing of the UN soldiers.
Monuc wants them arrested for the deaths.
In Bunia, the DRC defence minister said on his arrival the killers would be brought before the courts.
Armed groups had to know ”this was no longer a time in which they can perform acts that go unpunished,” said Adolphe Onusumba at Bunia airport.
”If they did that at the instigation of their leaders in Kinshasa, we’ll find that out too and measures will be taken,” he warned.
All five generals insist they are scrupulously observing commitments to government forces and not blocking demobilisation.
But a UN observer said: ”These gang leaders were promoted in order to decapitate the Ituri militias involved in atrocities against civilians. In return they were supposed to commit their troops to the national disarmament process. But they are not doing so.
”On the contrary some of them are fanning hatred from a distance.”
The Ituri militia appeared to be fragmenting, with shifting alliances causing further violence, said another UN official.
The appointment of the five militia leaders in December provoked new internal rivalries and the surfacing of new mini-warlords ”trying to get a slice of the cake” in a region rich in mineral wealth, the official reported.
Speaking from Kinshasa’s Grand Hotel where they are billetted, three of the five militia leaders appointed army generals condemned the UN killings and stressed they had lost contact with their bases.
One, Jerome Kakwavu, is suspected by the rights group Human Rights Watch of ordering the summary execution of 30 civilians since 2002 and participating personally.
Another, Germain Katanga, is accused by witnesses of having organised the massacre of 1&bsp;200 civilians at Nyakunde in 2002.
A third, Floribert Kisembo, is accused by Human Rights Watch of having forced victims to dig their own graves then having them executed.
”It is a matter of public notoriety that those contributing to destabilising Ituri are here in the Grand Hotel in Kinshasa, protected and given lodging at the expense of those on high,” said Monuc spokesperson Mamadou Bah.
The International Criminal court has announced it will issue an arrest warrant against a senior figure in Ituri. A political observer in Kinshasa suggested the generals might now be inclined to ”start sweating,” despite the Grand Hotel’s air conditioning. – Sapa-AFP