Congo Massacre

klesh · April 7, 2003, 18:01

Quote:

NAIROBI (Reuters) - The United Nations said on Sunday it had been told nearly 1,000 civilians were massacred by tribal militias with machetes and guns in northeast Democratic Republic of Congo last week and buried in mass graves.

"The (U.N.) investigating team heard that 966 people were massacred. They identified 20 mass graves and visited 49 seriously injured people in hospitals," Hamadoun Toure, spokesman for the U.N. mission in Congo (MONUC), told Reuters.

Witnesses said the massacre occurred on Thursday when attackers raided the town of Drodro and 14 neighboring villages near the Ituri district's capital Bunia, some 50 miles from the border with Uganda.

The identity of the attackers was unclear, but ethnic clashes in Ituri have killed thousands of people since 1999. Some local residents suggested ethnic hatred might have been the trigger for the latest killings.

Toure said MONUC investigators had talked to local priests, tribal leaders and eyewitnesses who said the orgy of killing lasted for three hours.

The investigators, who visited Drodro on Saturday, saw evidence of clothing and traces of blood above the mass graves, Toure said.

The massacre report emerged just days after Congo's warring factions signed a long-awaited political settlement to end several years of conflict in Africa's third biggest country.

CIVIL WAR

Congo was plunged into civil war in 1998 when Rwanda and Uganda backed an uprising in the east to overthrow the Kinshasa government. At one point, six foreign armies were drawn into the war for Congo's mineral wealth, and two million people are believed to have died, mainly from hunger and disease.

Ugandan army spokesman Shaban Bantariza said he was aware that "hundreds had been killed" in Drodro but was waiting for further information from army investigators.

Ugandan troops have remained in Ituri district at the request of the United Nations, which feared a power and security vacuum in the area.

Human rights groups say up to 500,000 people have fled their homes and 50,000 more have been killed in the past four years, as rival rebel factions, ethnic militias and the Ugandan army have fought for control of the gold-rich Ituri district.

Peace talks are planned for northeastern Congo, organized by the Ituri Pacification Commission (IPC) which is supported by the Congolese and Ugandan governments and MONUC.

Hema and Lendu tribal militias signed a cease-fire agreement in March to allow the IPC to begin its work and eventually lead to the withdrawal of Ugandan troops from eastern Congo.

Residents of Drodro, a mainly Hema town, said Thursday's attackers spoke a Lendu language.

Fresh fighting was reported on Sunday between Rwanda-backed Rally for Congolese Democracy (RCD-Goma) rebels and a tribal militia group in the eastern Congolese town of Bukavu.

RCD-Goma senior official Joseph Mudumbi told Reuters the Mai Mai tribal militia group was loyal to a former governor of Bukavu. The town is controlled by RCD-Goma.

A local journalist in Bukavu said later calm had returned to the town but that the Mai Mai group was still on the outskirts.

In the peace settlement signed last Wednesday, Congo's government, rebel groups and opposition parties agreed to a transitional government to rule the former Belgian colony for up to 2-1/2 years until its first democratic elections in four decades.

WBUR link.

Just heard on the radio (WBUR) that these 966 people were killed in a 2 1/2 hour orgy of excecutions.

-FMK.

Pekka · April 7, 2003, 18:12

omg this is horrible

.
These mass exectuions of innocent people is so disgusting.. and I can only imagine what kind of weapons they used.. Someone should figure out what to do with these kind of things.

H Tower · April 7, 2003, 19:06

wb, FMK. Now get your ass back to the on topic forums

klesh · April 7, 2003, 19:27

Obviously there are more important things going on in the world, Dave. Note the topic.

Sandman · April 7, 2003, 19:29

I really wish news stories were weighted according to the number dead. Then it would be more difficult to ignore the suffering in the third world.

klesh · April 7, 2003, 19:30

Yes, unfortunately their is no oil in the Congo.

Maniac · April 7, 2003, 19:30

Then 9/11 wouldn't even have made the headlines.

klesh · April 7, 2003, 19:32

/me is glad he didn't say that.

But, yes.

Pekka · April 7, 2003, 19:44

I guess so.. there are lots of problems in Africa.. it's just one big problem area.

What if we don't give aid money next time, but sponsor every western citizen a free trip to Africa to see the conditions and check out few massacre sites.

Lord Merciless · April 7, 2003, 20:09

Africa is in general a far bigger and worse sh1thole than ME. It's fortunate that madmen over there haven't developed global ambitions yet.

Tuberski · April 7, 2003, 20:22

Have you people had your heads in the sand?

This has been going on in the Congo for a long time.

ACK!

GePap · April 7, 2003, 20:30

Best guess is that sicne 1998 at least 2 million people have died in the low intensity war there. The reality is, that for all the constant attention the US and Europe pay to the ME, Africa and Asia remain the places were the most human suffering occurs, and Europe and the US really don't plant to really get involved at all.

CyberGnu · April 7, 2003, 20:33

Well, Clinton tried in Somalia, but it didn't work too well...

BTW, Gepap, I like your Voltaire quote.

Menlas · April 7, 2003, 20:39

Quote:

Originally posted by Field Marshal Klesh
Yes, unfortunately their is no oil in the Congo.

Hmmm

...sad but so true

Caesar the Great · April 7, 2003, 22:21

theres also no forseeable end to the problems there (then again that can be said for a lot of conflicts worldwide)

if international peacekeepers were sent there, it would result in more violence and more suffering..... eventually these people will have to get tired of killing eachother

chequita guevara · April 7, 2003, 22:23

Quote:

Originally posted by Field Marshal Klesh
Yes, unfortunately their is no oil in the Congo.

No, but there is plenty of other mineral wealth there. Congo is very, very important.

DanS · April 7, 2003, 22:27

There are diamonds in Congo, however.

klesh · April 7, 2003, 22:35

If only tanks and cars etc ran on diamonds...

ravagon · April 7, 2003, 22:39

Quote:

Originally posted by Field Marshal Klesh
If only tanks and cars etc ran on diamonds...

Tanks and cars also run on roads - of which Congo also has a deficit.

chequita guevara · April 7, 2003, 22:41

There is also most of the world's cobalt, as well as tungsten, uranium, and lost of other very important minerals.

red_mustard · April 8, 2003, 01:01

I dont know anyone from Congo. I dont pay Congo taxes. And I dont work for Congo. To say I give a **** is overstating my concern. These are there own problems.

klesh · April 8, 2003, 01:13

perfect.

red_mustard · April 8, 2003, 01:37

yawn

red_mustard · April 8, 2003, 01:38

I know this whole thing was a troll anyway. I could tell after seeing the first few comments about how we should somehow feel sorry about these guys. Which I wont.

And life goes on.

Az · April 8, 2003, 02:15

I wanted to post this story. Good work, FMK.

molly bloom · April 8, 2003, 02:42

Quote:

Originally posted by GePap
Best guess is that sicne 1998 at least 2 million people have died in the low intensity war there. The reality is, that for all the constant attention the US and Europe pay to the ME, Africa and Asia remain the places were the most human suffering occurs, and Europe and the US really don't plant to really get involved at all.

Uh, Gepap, as I may have mentioned briefly in the 'educating Ted Striker on African history' thread a while back- the U.S. has had its largest C.I.A. presence in Africa in the Demo. Rep. of Congo (formerly Zaire), since the overthrow of Patrice Lumumba and the installation of kleptocrat dictator Mobutu (now sadly dead without having stood trial). The U.S. donated in excess of 860 million dollars to Zaire, and in return got the eighth poorest country in the world. On the other hand it did get a very nice staging post for those American backed incursions into Angola (which does have significant oil deposits, Gulf Oil subsidiaries which export to the U.S., and has had a hideous civil war).

As chegitz mentioned, and as I mentioned previously too, Zaire/Congo contains 70% of the world's cobalt, significant deposits of uranium and the 'blood' diamonds which helped fund Mobutu's corrupt regime and Unita's civil war atrocities in Angola. You'll also be glad to know the Rockefellers had serious business interests in Zaire/Congo- so the devaluation of the Zairean currency meant also those lovely Zairean raw materials were jolly cheap- and all those finished export goods from the U.S. jolly expensive to import.

Nice to see some people making a profit from Africa's misery though. Wouldn't want to think all those Yanqui tax dollars had gone to waste...

Az · April 8, 2003, 02:46

Quote:

Best guess is that sicne 1998 at least 2 million people have died in the low intensity war there. The reality is, that for all the constant attention the US and Europe pay to the ME, Africa and Asia remain the places were the most human suffering occurs, and Europe and the US really don't plant to really get involved at all.

a simple Cost/benefit analysis really.

GePap · April 8, 2003, 11:20

Quote:

Originally posted by red_mustard
I dont know anyone from Congo. I dont pay Congo taxes. And I dont work for Congo. To say I give a **** is overstating my concern. These are there own problems.

Which is the same most people would say about Iraq if they had not been told "hey, Invade Iraq, payback for 9/11!".

And people wonder why others around the world look at the US and UK funny when they talk about how much they "care about democracy" and ending misery.

Molly Bloom:

The current war in Congo, I beleive, stems frm the aftermath of the Rwanda disaster. For all of the US's previous involvement in the area, I do believe what happened in the Congo was an all African production.

C0ckney · April 8, 2003, 11:39

yes it is. after the rwandan civil war, the victorious tutsis (sp?) backed a rebellion which eventually led to mobutu's downfall. this brought (the now late) laurent kabelia (sp?) to power, things seemed to be going allright, but then the rwandans found out that some of the hutus who had been responsible for the genocide in rwanda in 1994 were hiding in eastern congo.

they sent troops in to eastern congo and when the new congolese government complained, they decided that they didn't like them any more and started backing new rebel groups. they were joined by burundi and uganda in backing the rebels, while zambia, angloa and zimbabwe sent troops to back the government. the result has been a bloody war, which as others have said has claimed as many as two million lives. most foriegn troops have now left the country but the violence between various communities and groups still continues.

Sava · April 8, 2003, 12:49

I wonder if the wonderful humanitarian George Bush is paying any attention to this.