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/ 22 December 2007
The Security Council voted unanimously on Friday to extend the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) for a year and demanded that all militias and armed groups in the volatile east lay down their weapons and start disarming. The council asked the UN force ”to attach the highest priority to addressing the crisis”.
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/ 30 November 2007
United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit Ethiopia next week for meetings on the conflicts in the volatile African Great Lakes region and Sudan and Somalia, said the State Department on Thursday. Rice, a rare visitor to the African continent, will make her third trip to sub-Saharan Africa since becoming Secretary of State in 2005.
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/ 22 November 2007
United Nations peacekeepers will help the Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) army disarm eastern dissident groups by force in violence-plagued North Kivu province, UN and Congolese commanders said. Army soldiers and fighters loyal to renegade Tutsi general Laurent Nkunda clashed again on Thursday a few kilometres from Rutshuru.
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/ 22 November 2007
Fighting flared in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s powder keg east on Wednesday, as the army battled insurgent troops after killing 20 rebel soldiers who staged a pre-dawn attack. Men loyal to cashiered general Laurent Nkunda launched a raid on an army position near Rutshuru, the headquarters of an eponymous district in the troubled Nord-Kivu province.
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/ 13 November 2007
Thousands of refugees poured out of camps in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo’s violent North Kivu province on Tuesday after the army said Tutsi-dominated insurgents attacked its positions. Army troops repelled the dawn raid on their positions near Mugunga camp, killing 27 fighters loyal to renegade General Laurent Nkunda.
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/ 13 November 2007
The numbers of women seeking treatment for rape in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo has risen as a conflict that has already left four million dead over the past decade has reignited. Human rights groups describe gang rapes as commonplace and often accompanied by ”barbaric” acts of torture.
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/ 13 November 2007
United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon on Monday hailed as a ”significant breakthrough” last week’s agreement by the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Rwanda to deal with illegal armed groups in the eastern DRC. Ban urged both Kinshasa and Kigali to ”act urgently to implement all the agreed measures”.
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/ 23 October 2007
A commander of Uganda’s Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) has surrendered in northern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and is in the custody of Congolese authorities, the United Nations said on Tuesday. Opiyo Makasi, reported to be the rebel group’s operations and logistics commander, gave himself up along with his wife.
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/ 21 October 2007
Democratic Republic of Congo’s army on Sunday gave pro-government militia fighters 48 hours to disarm or face military action as thousands more people fled renewed fighting in the eastern province of North Kivu. Explosions and gunfire rang out before dawn in the hills around Rugari, a town of tin-roofed houses near the Rwandan and Ugandan borders.
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/ 19 October 2007
The Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) army says desertions have weakened rebel forces ahead of a planned offensive against them, but rebel general Laurent Nkunda remains defiant. On Thursday the army put on show what they said were 80 deserters wearing ragtag uniforms from Nkunda’s forces.
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/ 19 September 2007
Thousands of children are being forced into armed service in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) since fighting erupted between rebels and the Congolese army in North Kivu province in late August, the United Nations Children’s Fund said on Wednesday.
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/ 18 September 2007
Rwanda has made a thinly veiled threat to send its troops back into eastern Democratic Republic of Congo after accusing the government in Kinshasa of collaborating with genocidal Hutu extremists on its border. The Rwandan government said a Congolese army assault against a renegade Tutsi general, Laurent Nkunda, is helping to strengthen Hutu rebels.
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/ 17 September 2007
Ministers from Africa’s Great Lakes region made little headway in two days of talks on security overshadowed by growing violence and mutual mistrust. Foreign and defence ministers from Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) appealed for United Nations peacekeepers to intensify efforts to stamp out militias plaguing eastern DRC.
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/ 7 September 2007
Renegade Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) General Laurent Nkunda said on Friday the Congolese army had attacked his position, breaking a fragile ceasefire negotiated by United Nations mediators in eastern DRC. ”I have told Monuc [the United Nations mission in DRC] that we were attacked this morning [Friday],” Nkunda said.
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/ 6 September 2007
The United Nations fears that the refugee crisis in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) could worsen after the escalation of the conflict between government troops and soldiers loyal to a dissident general. Speaking to the BBC on Thursday, UN emergency relief coordinator John Holmes said that the crisis could aggravate the situation throughout the country.
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/ 4 September 2007
The United Nations refugee agency said on Tuesday that tens of thousands of Congolese refugees crossed into Uganda on Monday following renewed fighting between the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) army and renegade troops in the north-east of the vast country.