DR CONGO: The threat of renewed war in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo increased yesterday amid unconfirmed reports that Rwandan troops had already crossed the border to attack rebels based in the country.
A Congolese military commander said yesterday that Rwandan troops killed at least 19 Congolese civilians during an attack on a Congolese town. "Nineteen people have been killed in the attack on Bukumbirwa. These were civilians who died," said Col Etienne Bindu, the acting military commander of Congo's North Kivu region. He said the attack happened on Sunday.
The UN, which announced last week it was sending more peacekeepers and warned Rwanda against using military force, said its forces had not yet found evidence of an incursion.
There was no independent confirmation of an attack. However, Rwanda's President Paul Kagame hinted yesterday that the threatened attack against ethnic Hutu extremists in Congo might already have started.
"It will not take long, or could even be happening now," he told his country's senate. "Failure on the side of the UN and international community to deal with this threat means that we must pursue these extremists on our own," he said.
At the same time, Mr Mbusa Nyamwisi, the regional co-operation minister in Congo's power-sharing transitional government, was quoted as saying that Rwandan troops were "all over the place". He accused them of attacking and burning villages and raping and killing women. "We are on a war footing," he said.
The Congo government has said it will send at least 6,000 troops to the border area over the next two weeks to counter the rebel forces who are former Rwandan army and Hutu militia members. They had fled across the frontier following the genocide in 1994.
The sharp escalation in tension comes just days after heads of state from 11 countries signed a declaration to promote peace, security and development in Africa's Great Lakes region.
Rwanda has invaded its giant neighbour twice before in pursuit of rebels, in 1996 and 1998.
The second occasion ignited a war in Congo that lasted five years, drew in six foreign armies and is estimated to have caused three million deaths, making it Africa's costliest conflict.
South Africa, which brokered a peace deal between Rwanda and Congo in 2002, said it regarded troop movements in the border region as a serious concern and urged both countries to avoid confrontation.
The 2002 deal committed Rwanda to withdrawing its troops from Congo in return for steps to disarm and repatriate the Hutu rebels. But progress on disarmament has been slow.
Talks hosted by South Africa brought Congo's civil war to an end last year and led to the inauguration of the transitional government under President Joseph Kabila. Congo officials suspect Rwanda of using the presence of Hutu rebels as a pretext to control the exploitation of mineral and timber resources in eastern Congo.