AFRICA/CONGO DR - “The violence in North Kivu has never ceased,” says UN Special Representative for Congo

Kinshasa (Agenzia Fides) – There is no peace for North Kivu, the region to the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, where various armed groups are working, some of them from foreign countries. “The violence has never ceased.” said Alan Doss, Special Representative of the UN Secretary General for Congo, in a press conference.
Those mainly responsible for the violence are members of the Democratic Liberation Forces of Rwanda (FDLR), which is formed by former members of the Rwandan hutus which since 1994 have taken refuge in the forest of North Kivu. The presence of this movement has long been a cause of confrontation between the governments of Rwanda and the DRC, until February of this year, when the two nations' armies led a joint military operation against hutu soldiers (see Fides 27/4/2009). The reaction of the FDLR was to take their revenge on the innocent civilians of North Kivu. In recent days, the various towns in the region, the FDLR has set over 250 homes on fire. Five children have died in the fires and one woman, who died of a heart attack, not to mention the dead, wounded, and forced to flee as a result of previous attacks.
However, the greatest concern comes from the news that several armed groups wish to pull out of the Amani (“peace”) Program, which called for the disarmament and reintegration of fighters from the various groups operating in the province. The announcement is found in a letter that was sent to the Program's coordinator, Fr. Apollinaire Malu Malu. In the note, the authors lament the fact that the government has not kept its promises. In particular, the freeing of prisoners, the payment for disarmament, and the insertion of the former guerrillas into the regular army.
Those who signed the letter encourage their own men to call off the program of disarmament, and re-enter their movements.
There are also street bandits active on the outskirts of Butembo and Beni. According to Congo's press, these men are well-armed and speak English, Kiganda, Kikonzo, Kinyarwanda and Swahili of east Africa. They must not be locals, therefore, but natives of areas bordering DRC. According to observers, these men appear to want to continue destabilizing North Kivu, under the auspices of vandalism, another one of the disguises used by those who have been spreading chaos and death for years, in an effort to get their hands on the natural resources of North Kivu (gold, diamonds, coltan, and timber, etc...). The impression is given that the province has mysterious ancestral hostilities, so as to had the manipulation that is taking place. (LM) (Agenzia Fides 13/5/2009)