conflict - DR Congo - Laurent Nkunda - North Kivu - Rwanda
Scenes from a battle zone
Wednesday 19 November 2008
Rebel forces and the Congolese army have been fighting in the DR Congo since August. Special correspondents Arnaud Zajtman, Marlène Rabaud and Philippe Bolopion criss-crossed the poorly-accessible North Kivu province to report on the conflict.
Wednesday 19 November 2008
By Arnaud Zajtman - Clea CAULCUTT (text)
Renegade leader Laurent Nkunda has been leading a rebellion against the Congolese government of Joseph Kabila since August 2008. He claims he is defending local Tutsis against the Interahamwe, a Rwandan Hutu militia, some of whom have been implicated in the 1994 genocide of Tutsis and moderate Hutus in neighbouring Rwanda.
Nkunda men actively recruit soldiers from Tutsi refugee camps and from demobilised soldiers of the Rwandan army. Kinshasa accuses Rwandan troops of direct involvement with the rebels, but this has not been proved.
According to the International Crisis Group the rebels receive military supplies and medical assistance from Rwanda. Nkunda’s forces are estimated at 5,000 by the UN. FRANCE 24’s correspondent Arnaud Zajtman reports that one of the rebel groups he met were well-organised and efficiently supplied.
Report: Arnaud Zajtman, DR Congo, November 17 2008
The fighting between the comparatively ill-equipped Congolese army and Nkunda’s National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP), has uprooted over 250,000 civilians since September.
Report: Philippe Bolopion, DR Congo, November 6 2008
While the UN has decried the human rights abuses committed by rebel forces, it was unable to protect the victims against their aggressors.
France 24 interview, November 11, 2008
Children are easy targets for rebel groups and army forces alike who recruit them as child soldiers.
In a refugee camp in Kanyabayonga, Zajtman met a group of child soldiers who had fled the village of Kiwanja, before joining the anti-rebel Mai-Mai militia. They say Laurent Nkunda targeted their parents in a revenge spree during the fighting between Mai-Mai and CNDP forces. The youngest are barely nine years old.
Report: Arnaud Zajtman, Marlène Rabaud, DR Congo, November 17 2008
01/12/2008 15:35:14 Alert a moderator
peuple tutsi
By meurrisse - kenya
Cher compatriote ne vous laissez pas tromper par laurent kunda qui vous dit que il se mattre pour votre cause, alors il s'enrichit pour son propre compte et pour sa famille ,aprt ca il est au service des autres qui ne sont pas vous
21/11/2008 22:02:52 Alert a moderator
Should the Eastern Congo be ruled by a warlod?
By Anonyme - usa
Is the west in support of a Democraticly elected government or in support of a self appointed warlord leader?
Nkunda has demonstrated is mastery of war waging against a disorganized Congoleese army. It's fascinating seing him on CNN, BBC or France24, yet he was elected by no one nor did he seek anyone's vote!!!
What makes him a legitimate leader??
He is actively carving a territory for his Tutsi people in Congo territory, right by Rwanda's Border; thus pushing the million of people living around into United Nation's refugee camps. Isn't that ETHNIC CLEANSING in its pure form? This is just as bad as DARFUR or worse!
Stop the madness, and tell Nkunda that if he wants to be a true leader for all the Congoleese in Kivu, he needs to run for Governor during the next elections, and not impose himself by his fighting superiority.
Come on guys, this is the 21st century. If you don't believe in a Democratic solution for this conflicts, please stop preaching it, and let them fight it until the last man is left standing like in the stone age!!!
The kids that are being stuffed like animals in those refugee camps, seing their sisters used as sex slaves, and their parents shot dead between the eyes will one day ask for justice or seek revenge. In the abscence of the rule of law, Nkunda self fulfilling profecy of a Tutsi genocide may just came to pass.