Source: http://alfajiri1.wordpress.com/the-cycle-of-horror-in-the-great-lakes-region/
The cycle of horror in the Great Lakes region
I grew up in the city of Bukavu in south Kivu. From my bed, I could see Rwanda on the other side of the lake Kivu. Bukavu was a great place to live ; even during the last years of Zaire. Indeed, many neighbours, especially rwandans , prefered to struggle for life in Zaïre along with zairians, than staying in Rwanda where ethnic hatred was undermining chances of peace between Hutus and Tutsis. Then, Hutus and Tutsis could better live in Zaïre than in Rwanda.
Bukavu
During the 90’s, ethnic tensions are at their peak in Rwanda and Burundi. In 1993, the first elected president in Burundi, Melchior Ndadaye, is savagely butchered by Tutsis soldiers. He was a Hutu. Tension get higher in Rwanda then, as Hutus was rulling the country and fighting a Tutsi rebellion, the RPF. Mistrust of each other gave birth, particularly in Rwanda in 1994, to large scale massacres. During the rwandan genocide a million had been butchered ! In July 1994, the RPF seized all the country and all the former governement ran abroad like in Zaire for instance..
Melchior Ndadaye
With the advance of RPF, many Hutus choosed to run away from « these Tutsis who came to have their revenge ». They came into Zaire while Tutsis from Zaire was managing to go back in Rwanda. After a couple of days, more than a million had already crossed the border, invanding Bukavu, Goma and all the villages around.
Hutus Refugees crossing the Zairian border
The UN settled camps for them in Mugunga (North Kivu) and Kashusha (South Kivu). Kigali’s new athorities considered those camps as a actual threat as those responsible for the genocide was among innocent people and was training to go back « finish the job » in Rwanda. While the whole world was denouncing the genocide, with slogans like « never again », none could have guessed that worse was about to come. In 1996, the Afdl of Kabila started fighting against Mobutu. Supported by Rwanda and Uganda, he seized the country after 7 months ! His troops was actually mainly composed by Tutsis soldiers from both Rwanda and Uganda who wanted to seized the opportunity to wipe out Hutus milicia ( Interahamwe). Everything is in place for a clash between brothers enemies on Congolese soil. Congolese found themselves caught between two fires. This is the basis of the carnage of Kivu.
Laurent Désiré Kabila, Afdl leader
Once in Zaire units RPA (Rwandan patriotic army) employed firstly to empty the refugee camps. Hutu militias plunged into the Congolese jungle. While some civilians have been forcibly repatriated to Rwanda, others have had no choice but to flee deeper into Zaire.
Refugees mouvements in the region
Those who could not escape, the wounded, the elderly, children , were killed , victims of shell fired by units RPA in Kashusha and in Mugunga. It numbered more than 400,000 people fleeing in the Congolese jungle. The plight of these people surpass all understanding and ignorance of their suffering will be all the more disgusting. The UN will just state that they have disapeared in the forest !!!
Hutu refugees going deeper in DRC, 1996
Indeed, the Hutu refugees were now out of sight except from Congoleses. The revenge could now begin ! Kindu, Ubundu, Tingi Tingi and beyond , the graves flourished . The units of the APR trapped refugees in the forest and excelled in method of mass execution. The UN mapping report traces those killings in the DRC and emphasize the systematic tracking Hutu refugees. Thus, if the APR brought order in Rwanda after the genocide, i twas also specialized in large scale massacres across the Rusizi in DRC . People of Kivu were also slaughtered because of the fact of their presence : Kasika where hundreds of women were buried alive by the RPA, Makobola massacre, and many others.
Killings in South Kivu, 1998
It was during this period, about 1999, that the first reports of mass rape began to surface. The torture of our women actually respond to new expansive view of Rwanda in eastern Congo . Kivu population no longer knows peace since that time !
Taken hostage in their own home by Hutu militia on one side and the mainly Tutsi Rwandan army on the other , kivu people pays a heavy price for this cycle of hate. In response, they organized themselves into local militias : the Mai Mai ! They are these villagers who had enough to see their relatives get slaughtered without reason by foreigners.
In 2003, the APR has officially left the DRC , but to keep a grip on the rich land and discovered mines in east Drc, Rwanda and Uganda will create fake rebel movements.
Since these groups are active in the country to keep the space uncontrollable and facilitate the looting.
These countries officially praise these rebels movements internationally and, informally , provide reinforcement , weapons and plan attacks. This is the situation that is still ongoing today even if these movements have changed names several times. RCD ->CNDP ->M23, both are the same people ! (Nkunda, Ntaganda, …).
Our role today as human beings is to expose this hypocrisy that has costed the DRC more than 6, 000,000 souls. It’s not about taking any sides but the justice’s and humanity’s one. Rwandan and Ugandan officials behind this massacre shouldn’t be praised by any government as we can see today. Because it is a permanent insult to all those who died to treat as heroes the notorious criminals of the region.
Kagame from Rwanda and Museveni from Uganda
Links:
Hutu ordeal in Kivu + Kisangani diary by Hubert Sauper : (the 400000 who disapeard)
Mapping report by UN :
Denis Mukwege, the Congolese doctor who heals raped women
No comments:
Post a Comment