A UN-BACKED military operation in eastern Congo in which government soldiers are accused of massacring hundreds of civilians will end this month, the top UN official in Congo said yesterday.
“Kimia II will be completed on December 31st,” the UN special envoy to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Alan Doss, told the Security Council during a meeting on the UN peacekeeping mission there, known as Monuc.
The UN has backed Congolese government forces in a nine-month operation called Kimia II against Rwandan Hutu rebels in Congo’s east. The UN says it bolstered stability by supporting the operation but aid agencies had argued against UN support due to heavy civilian casualties and abuse. Mr Doss said the operation’s main goal – to disperse the rebels and weaken their ability to exploit Congo’s mineral wealth – “has been largely achieved although we do recognise that there have been very serious humanitarian consequences”.
But the fight against the rebels, some of whom are suspected of participating in neighbouring Rwanda’s 1994 genocide, is not over, he said. “The FDLR [Rwandan Hutu rebels] remains a potential threat and they will seek to return to their strongholds and punish the population for collaboration with governmental forces, if they are allowed to do so,” he warned the 15-nation council.
Rights activists say Congo’s ill-disciplined army, cobbled together from former rebels, militia groups and government loyalists, is one of the country’s worst human rights abusers. – (Reuters)