CONTENTS | ANB-BIA HOMEPAGE | WEEKLY NEWS
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Congo
RDC |
VIOLENCE
A medical worker describes the situation in Congo RDC
In spite of the cease-fire in the fighting in Congo RDC, ever since the UN started its deployment there, the human suffering caused by the war has not yet ceased. Rogue militiamen still impose terror, and life is still blighted by violence and hunger and disease.
Over two million people are thought to have lost their lives in Congo, with a further two million estimated to have been displaced. As if this is not enough, one would have thought that the very people who ought to be desirous of peace, are the ones still killing more of their Congolese brothers and sisters. Disheartening reports received recently, indicate that hundreds of people have been killed by their fellow villagers who accuse them of being witches.
Terror in the villages
In an interview, a Ugandan army spokesman, Lt. Colonel Phinehas Katirima, says that over 800 suspected witches were hacked to death in villages in rebel-held north-eastern Congo, in killings that began on 15 June. The lynching, targeting villagers accused of using special charms to kill fellow villagers, usually follow «confessions» obtained through torture. According to witnesses in the Aru region some 80 kilometres from the border with Sudan, having «confessed», the victims are frogmarched away and hacked to death.
Others have died in the region from diseases which are treatable, but because of the three-year-old war, hospitals and other health units have been closed down. Katirima says more than 200 others fled to a Ugandan army detachment to escape from their fellow villagers in Aru looking for their blood.
Maria Kirwin is a medical worker from Kent, working in Congo RDC. Recently she stated that the Congolese are fighting against overwhelming odds. «They are amazing people and they are just surviving. They are desperate to survive. Every day is taken up with the business of survival»
The current killings have led Church leaders and human rights groups to call upon the international community to give a helping hand, especially by providing medicine and shelter. They want the international community to also intervene and stop the mass killing of suspected witches in north-eastern Congo
«Someone must stop the barbaric killings. These people are innocent,» says Mr. Peter Ruyenzi, an official of the Human Rights Defense Association. «The victims are people who have been affected by the long civil war in the country. Most of these people are not witches, but they are coerced into admitting they are».
Apparently, few of those arrested for the killings have shown any sign of remorse. They maintain that they were being arrested for carrying out what they call a duty, «to eradicate wizards from the villages».
Human rights groups in Congo, want the international community and rebels from the Movement for the Liberation of Congo who are controlling the area, to do whatever is possible to stop the killings. Ruyenzi said that it is unfortunate the Ugandan-backed rebels controlling the area, have not rescued the innocent people being killed. Ugandan troops have been in north-eastern Congo since 1998, supporting the rebellion against the central Congolese government. The Ugandan government had started withdrawing the troops, but these were recently sent back to Aru district to stop the killings and arrest suspected killers. Also, the Governor of Ituri province in Congo RDC, Major Bule Ebangolo Basabe, has ordered the deployment of more Congolese rebel troops to police the north-eastern district of Aru, where most of the killings are taking place. (The administration of north-eastern Congo falls under MLC rebel leader, Jean Pierre Bemba.
Bule said he has adopted a proactive approach in handling the situation. «Since my arrival, I’ve held meetings with the local authorities and ordered more patrols in the disturbed areas. I also went on air on the local FM station (Radio Maison Océan) to sensitise the people. I told them it was illegal to kill or banish people».
The worst hit areas vis à vis human suffering, are in the eastern part of the country, in areas controlled by Congolese rebels and their backers, Uganda and Rwanda. The population largely depends on international organisations, such as Doctors without Frontiers, the British medical charity, Merlin, and the International Committee of the Red Cross for their medical requirements. A lone DC3 built in the forties, delivers emergency food supplies to this stricken part of the country. It can carry just four tons, enough to feed 4,000 people for just one day. The UN budget for the airlift will run out in a month and then deliveries will stop.
On the Congo River, a team of nurses from Merlin use motorised dug-out canoes to cross from their base on the Western Bank. They can only go further on motorcycles. The war has closed nearly all the roads, thus hiding the horrors it has caused. A sense of helplessness prevails, despite the current military disengagement.
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