The leader of a splinter group of Rwandan Hutu rebels operating in the volatile eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has said his fighters are disarming and preparing to return home.
Seraphin Bizimungu said members of his breakaway faction of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), had turned in their weapons and begun educational courses to ready themselves for re-integration into Rwandan society.
”Today we have opened a pilot assembly camp to begin the process of a peaceful return of refugees and ex-fighters,” he told reporters at Luvungi, about 60km south of Bukavu, capital of the DRC’s South Kivu province.
Bizimungu, who split from the FDLR after accusing the group’s leadership of failing to abide by a March agreement to disarm and return to Rwanda, said about 50 fighters and their families were now enrolled in the re-training scheme.
Officials at a ceremony here declined to say how many fighters Bizimungu — also known as ”General Amani” — has under his control although his faction is thought to number at least several hundred.
The 10-day course will include classes in conflict resolution and reconciliation intended to ease the participants’ re-entry into Rwanda, which is still coming to terms with its 1994 genocide, Bizimungu said.
After the training, the ex-fighters will go through a United Nations transit camp in Kamanyola near Luvungi before returning home, a UN official said.
Bizimungu added that the speed of the repatriation would depend on the governments of Rwanda and DRC as well as the international community.
Rwandan officials say many members of the FDLR, which has been hiding in dense forests of the eastern DRC for the past 11 years, were active participants in the genocide during which about 800 000 people, mainly minority Tutsis were slaughtered by Hutu extremists.
Kigali reacted suspiciously to the FDLR’s March 31 announcement in Rome that it would abandon its weapons and return home, saying that any fighters suspected of involvement in the genocide would have to stand trial.
The main FDLR leadership has since demanded security guarantees for the fulfillment of the pledge, leading to delays and frustration from some, notably those in Bizimungu’s faction, who say they are ready to return home.
The international community and governments in Africa’s Great Lakes region have blamed the FDLR for continued instabilty in the restive eastern DRC with Kigali accusing it of continuing to mount attacks in Rwanda.
In late August, officials from Rwanda, the DRC and Uganda gave the FLDR a one-month to disarm and begin returning home in line with the March declaration or face ”serious consequences”. – AFP
