More than 50,000 people have fled fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo in the past few days, with hundreds of thousands made homeless and destitute during the latest flare up in a war which has already killed 5 million people and involved all of DRC’s neighbours at one point or another. The situation in DRC is by no means straight forward. The United Nation — which has warned of impending humanitarian disaster and the danger of conflict spreading to the rest of Southern and Central Africa — has 17,000 peacekeepers deployed in DRC in support of the Congolese government … which is allied with the remnants of the Hutu militias which carried out the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. The Tutsi rebels led by General Laurent Nkunda, who say they are acting in self defence against the Hutu militias, are supported by the Rwandan government in Kigali. To complicate the situation further, the Congolese government has reportedly appealed to Angola for help, while other neighbouring states (and others further afield) also have an interest in helping themselves to DRC’s natural resources.

It appears that the scale of the disaster may yet be mitigated:

The rebels who have encircled this strategic town in eastern Congo, casting this region into a vortex of violence and uncertainty once again, seemed to be respecting the unilateral truce they declared on Wednesday night.

“Today there has been no fighting,” said Lt. Col. Samba Tall, a commander for the United Nations peacekeepers in Congo. “All belligerents are abiding by the cease-fire.”

Things are still dire:

On Wednesday night, in the security vacuum that opened up with the rebels marching toward town and the Congolese army fleeing in droves, rogue government soldiers turned on the people of Goma. The blood-soaked results were literally on display Thursday morning.

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Congolese soldiers are infamous for training their guns on civilians and fleeing at the first sign of a real threat. The looting, pillaging, raping and killing seems to happen every time a city switches hands.

United Nations officials said they were negotiating intensely on Thursday with government commanders and the rebels’ leader, Laurent Nkunda, to solidify the cease-fire. On Wednesday, Mr. Nkunda had declared the cease-fire, saying he did not want to spread more fear in Goma.

Mr. Nkunda, a renegade Congolese general, has said he is waging war to protect the Tutsi people. Congolese officials accuse him of being a front man for neighboring Rwanda, which is led by Tutsi, and say that Mr. Nkunda is trying to carve out a buffer zone between Congo and Rwanda. Rwandan officials deny this and on Thursday there were high level talks between the two countries.

One of the biggest concerns now is the hundreds of thousands of people who have been displaced by all the fighting. Many of them are sleeping in the rain, with no food and gravely ill children. So far, aid workers have been unable to reach them.

★ Posted on 30 October, 2008 by hakmao