Democratic Republic of Congo
Ituri - How many more have to die?
Five years on
August 2 2003 marks the fifth anniversary of the start of the
conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). While
international attention focuses on the installation of a new
transitional government in the capital Kinshasa and the supposed
end to the war, the atrocities in the east of the country continue.
Following a three-week research mission to eastern DRC and
neighbouring Uganda, Amnesty International concludes that the need
for effective intervention by the international community remains
as urgent as ever.
'The vast majority of Congo's people are desperate for
peace to return to their country so that they can begin to pick up
the pieces of their broken lives,' said Amnesty
International today, one week after returning from the region.
'But as the massacres, mutilations and rapes continue
throughout the Ituri and Kivu regions, it would be a triumph of
vain hope over bitter, daily experience for the Congolese people of
eastern DRC to believe that peace has genuinely returned to their
communities.'
Fleeing for their lives
In Bunia, Ituri's capital, some 20,000 residents are currently
living in makeshift camps for internally displaced persons
(IDPs), under the military protection of international
troops. Most of these IDPs have fled for their lives from the
ethnic violence between warring militias which has decimated Bunia
and its surroundings in recent months, and they remain too
terrified to return to their homes.
K., a 25-year-old Nande civilian, has been in an IDP camp since 10
May, after members of the Hema-dominated UPC militia forced their
way into his home. The militia-men demanded of each of the 20 or so
people in the house what ethnic group they belonged to and then
used sticks and daggers to beat and stab one woman and three men to
death, all of them civilians. The remaining men were then taken out
of the house, given sticks, and made to advance in front of the UPC
soldiers as human shields. As the UPC advanced, they entered nearby
houses and systematically macheted and stabbed to death non-Hema
civilians. In the course of two hours, K. witnessed the
cold-blooded slaughter of some 50 people.
Tens of thousands of other Ituri civilians have fled the province
altogether over the last year. On 6 May alone, some 6,000 Bunia
civilians, including many Hema, accompanied the withdrawing Ugandan
army to the Ugandan border. Others, including many Lendu, Bira and
Alur, fled south to North-Kivu province, in particular to the towns
of Oicha and Erengeti.
L., a 35 year-old Hema woman who fled east from Bunia on 10 May,
was stopped and taken prisoner by Lendu and Ngiti militia in the
village of Bavi on 11 May. The militia were systematically singling
out people whom they suspected of being Hema and seeking
confirmation of their suspicions from a local witch-doctor
(féticheur). After the witch-doctor denounced L. as a
Hema, they took all of her clothes except for a single garment and
imprisoned her overnight in a waterlogged pit in the ground around
a metre deep with two other older Hema women. These two women, one
of whom was called Edroni, were later taken out of the hole
and hacked to death by Ngiti militia using hand-axes. L. herself
managed to escape and reach Uganda.
Photo caption: A camp for Ituri's displaced civilians
next to Bunia's airport. The tanks guarding the camp belong to
MONUC.© AI
The limited scope of the French-led multinational force
There are two international military presences in Bunia. The first
is the United Nations observer mission known as MONUC. The second
is an Interim Emergency Multinational Force (IEMF) led by France
and mandated by the United Nations to remain in Bunia until 1
September.
Since its deployment in on 6 June, the IEMF, which has been
almost universally welcomed by the civilian population of Bunia,
has contributed greatly to improving the security situation in
Bunia itself, in particular around the airport and the MONUC
headquarters in town. However, despite day-time and night-time
armoured patrols through the town centre, as well as occasional
reconnaissance missions beyond Bunia to outlying areas, the IEMF
has not attempted to fully secure all the districts of Bunia, and
still less to bring greater security to other regions in Ituri,
with the result that many abuses have continued.
At the end of June, in the Saio district of Bunia, a 45-year-old
Bira woman and her 13-year-old daughter were woken from their sleep
by a group of young UPC militia-men, who demolished a door to force
their way into the house. Once inside they looted and destroyed
property and accused the mother and daughter of hiding Lendu
combatants in their home. They then attempted to abduct the
daughter. When the mother tried to intervene, both she and her
daughter were brutally raped side-by-side by two of the
militia-men, not far from their home. Both women suffered injuries
as a result of the attack.
Without a meaningful international military presence outside Bunia,
appalling massacres have been continuing unchecked throughout the
province. On 22 July in the town of Nizi to the north of Bunia,
some 22 civilians were massacred by Lendu and Ngiti militia. Many
of the corpses, riddled with bullet holes, had been butchered with
knives and machetes -- internal organs and genital organs had been
cut from the bodies.
On 15 July an alliance of Lendu and Ngiti militia and elements of
the Nande-dominated RCD-ML – an armed group which is given
direct military support by the Kinshasa government -- attacked the
town of Tchomia on the shores of Lake Albert, which is under the
control of a Hema-dominated armed faction called PUSIC. In the
course of around ten hours of intense fighting, some 80 people,
including many civilians, were killed and dozens of others were
taken hostage by the attacking militia, some three-quarters of whom
were child soldiers. Around 200 houses, accounting for around one
fifth of the town, were destroyed.
This latest attack on Tchomia followed an even more devastating
confrontation on 31 May, when RCD-ML combatants again attacked
Tchomia and deliberately targeted the hospital, killing some 34
people there, mainly Hema and Alur, including women and children.
The overall death toll of around six hours of fighting was
reportedly some 300 people. The only civilians remaining in Tchomia
today are those who are too poor to pay the $3US dollars required
to take a canoe ride across Lake Albert to the comparative safety
of neighbouring Uganda.
Photo caption: MONUC soldiers on guard outside the
MONUC headquarters in Bunia. The armoured vehicle in the background
belongs to the French-led multinational force. ©
AI
Photo caption: Victims of the massacre in Nizi on 22
July2003. © Private
Photo caption: Refugee widows with their children in
the Ugandan town of Ntoroko, bordering Lake Albert. Their husbands
were killed during militia attacks on Tchomia and neighbouring
Kasenyi in May 2003. © AI
The responsibilities of regional governments
The Kinshasa government, through its support for the RCD-ML,
continues to be directly implicated in the bloodshed in eastern
DRC. Despite their official withdrawal from eastern DRC, Rwanda and
Uganda also continue to provide support to the armed factions
operating in Ituri. Uganda has supported PUSIC and the FAPC of
Commander Jerome Kakwavu, whose stronghold is in the north-eastern
Ituri towns of Aru and Mahagi. Both Uganda and Rwanda have at
different times supported the UPC of Thomas Lubanga. The UPC has
also entered into a formal alliance with the RCD-Goma, the main
Rwandese-backed armed political group in eastern DRC, which has
continued to wage war in the province of North-Kivu, in spite of
the ceasefire supposedly in force. All of these groups have been
responsible for gross human rights abuses.
As recently as mid-July, Chief Kahwa Mandro, the leader of PUSIC,
was once again present with his militia in the Bundibugyo district
of western Uganda, where tens of thousands of Congolese have taken
refuge. The ostensible purpose of his visit was to recruit Hema
refugees into the ranks of PUSIC. It is inconceivable that the
Ugandan authorities were unaware of his presence there, given the
substantial Ugandan army deployment in the district, close to the
towns where most of the refugees are concentrated.
The failure of MONUC
MONUC was originally deployed to the DRC to monitor the
implementation of a ceasefire accord signed in Lusaka, Zambia, in
1999. Small numbers of MONUC personnel have been present in Bunia
for a number of years. MONUC has played a facilitating role in the
holding of peace talks between warring factions and in the
distribution of humanitarian aid, it has conducted sporadic
investigations into human rights abuses committed during the
conflict and it has monitored and reported on many of the
violations of the nominal ceasefire.
However, a hostage to its weak mandate and often lacking the
necessary equipment, personnel and international political backing,
MONUC's record in promoting the security of the civilian
population has been little short of disgraceful. The organisation
has on occasion stood by as civilians have been killed, sometimes
within direct view of MONUC compounds. When in mid-May the UPC
issued threats over the radio against civilians in Bunia's IDP
camps, MONUC rightly denounced this as a flagrant violation of its
mandate under Chapter VII of the UN Charter to 'protect
civilians under imminent threat of physical violence'. But the
reality is that MONUC has consistently failed to implement this
crucial element of its mandate – with the most devastating of
consequences for the civilian population.
Countless deaths and the displacement of tens of thousands of
civilians could have been prevented had MONUC intervened
effectively after the withdrawal of Ugandan troops from Bunia on 6
May. MONUC must have been acutely aware of the inevitability of
further ethnically-targeted slaughter if it failed to intervene,
the fact that it did not demonstrates the ineffectiveness of this
force and the lack of will within the United Nations Security
Council to adequately address the human rights crisis in eastern
DRC. Adequate troop deployment in early May would undoubtedly have
prevented the subsequent bloodshed.
The weakness and lack of resolve of MONUC was further underscored
in a humiliating incident on 18 July when a MONUC-led convoy
attempting to travel from Bunia to the North-Kivu town of Beni was
stopped some 30km south of Bunia by around a dozen Lendu child
soldiers, ranging in age from 8 to 16. Despite being well-armed and
disposing of several armoured vehicles, the MONUC convoy failed to
impose its will on these child soldiers and instead returned to
Bunia.
Photo caption: Bangladeshi MONUC reinforcements on
arrival at Bunia's airport in July 2003. ©
AI
The continuing and urgent need for effective international intervention
The violence in Ituri is the result of a power struggle between
leaders of rival armed groups in the region. These leaders have
remorselessly manipulated tensions between different ethnic groups
to further their own political and economic interests. This has not
been a war in which civilians have been the unfortunate victims of
'collateral damage', but one in which civilians have
consistently and deliberately been targeted. The primary military
undertaking of the armed factions operating in Ituri –
including the UPC, PUSIC, FNI, FRPI, RCD-ML, and FAPC - has been
the systematic extermination of people, civilians or otherwise, on
the basis of their ethnic identity, regardless of their age or
gender.
Mutual hatred among the ethnic groups of Ituri, fuelled by
political and militia leaders, is now so deep and entrenched that
it will take years for these rifts to begin to heal. It is
essential that the international community is there in force, both
to nurture along that healing process and, where necessary, to
directly confront the militia who would continue the killing.
In the meantime, the civilian population of Bunia continues to live
in fearful anticipation of what further atrocities may ensue if the
French-led multinational force withdraws as planned on 1 September,
without there being a robust and committed MONUC force in place
which is willing to intervene militarily to save their lives. On 28
July the UN Security Council passed Resolution 1493, extending
MONUC's mandate until 30 July 2004 and authorising MONUC,
acting under Chapter VII of the UN Charter, to use all necessary
means to protect civilian lives.
If the blood of the helpless civilians of Bunia flows once again in
September, as it did in May, the primary culprits will be the
militia leaders and the gangs, including children, they employ to
implement their 'program' of ethnic hatred and cleansing.
But if it should stand by and allow this to happen again, MONUC
itself, as the embodiment of the will of international community,
would be morally culpable for its failure to save lives. It is no
longer enough for MONUC to simply 'observe'; with its
recently reinforced mandate, it is time for MONUC to act, and to
act effectively, to prevent further countless, and needless,
deaths.
Amnesty International's recommendations
Amnesty International in principle welcomes the passing of UN
Security Council Resolution 1493 reinforcing MONUC's mandate.
However, the success of the strengthened MONUC force in Ituri will
depend to a great extent on its ability, and its political will, to
face down the militias militarily, as well as on its ability to
build effective relations with the local civilian population.
Success will also depend on the cooperation of key actors in the
armed conflict. Amnesty International is therefore urging
that:
· MONUC fully implements its newly reinforced mandate
under Chapter VII and intervenes decisively to protect civilian
lives.
· MONUC is provided with all necessary combat
personnel, equipment and training to fulfil its mandate.
· MONUC deploys throughout all districts of Bunia
and, progressively, throughout the rest of Ituri.
· MONUC has adequate numbers of French-speaking
liaison and humanitarian affairs officers to facilitate
communication with local communities.
· Uganda, Rwanda, and the Kinshasa
government end all military and political support to the armed
groups operating in DRC, all of whom have been responsible for
gross human rights abuses.
Amnesty International also welcomes the decision of the Prosecutor
of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to collect
preliminary evidence on crimes committed in Ituri since July 2002
which may fall within the ICC's jurisdiction. AI hopes that
this will lead to full ICC investigations and prosecutions. All
parties to the conflict in eastern DRC, and all relevant national
and international institutions, should cooperate fully to ensure
that those responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity
are brought to justice. These crimes include the targeted and
deliberate killing of civilians on the basis of their ethnic
identity, incitation to ethnic hatred and the use of child soldiers
under the age of 15.
In addition, an appropriate judicial mechanism should be set up
with a view to investigating human rights abuses committed prior to
July 2002 and bringing the perpetrators to justice.
Abbreviations used in the text:
FAPC Forces armées pour le Congo (Armed Forces for
the Congo)
FNI Forces nationalistes et intégrationistes
(Nationalist and Integrationist Forces)
FRPI Front révolutionnaire pour l'Ituri
(Revolutionary Front for Ituri)
RCD-Goma Rassemblement congolais pour la démocratie
– Goma (Congolese Rally for Democracy – Goma)
RCD-ML Rassemblement congolais pour la démocratie –
Mouvement de libération
PUSIC Parti pour l'unité et la sauvegarde de l'integrité du Congo (Party for Unity and the Safeguarding of Congo's Unity)
IDP Internally displaced person
IEMF Interim Emergency Multinational Force
MONUC Mission de l'organisation des Nations unies au Congo (UN mission in the Congo)
ICC International Criminal Court
Further information
For further information on the human rights crisis in Ituri, please refer to the AI report 'On the precipice: the deepening human rights and humanitarian crisis in Ituri' (AFR 62/006/2003, March 2003).
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