Many thanks to the voices of peace!

Guelord

There is a point that I would like to make and everyone should know about all around the world. In the African Great Lakes Region, one genocide still leads to another because those who commit genocide are not dealt with.

After the 1994 genocide against Tutsi in Rwanda, Rwandese armed forces (FAR) and Interahamwe militias were welcome to settle in East Congo. They were hosted as refugee, except that they pass the border with tanks and heavy weaponry. Mobutu’s government allowed them to keep their military equipment and to pursue their hunt for Tutsis while in asylum. Congo and the international community failed to neutralize, disarm and prosecute Rwandese armed forces (FAR) and Interahamwe militias who committed the Rwanda genocide against Tutsi in 1994. As a result, a second genocide was perpetrated against Tutsi populations based in East Congo, by those same people.

In East Congo, Tutsis have not been the only civilians targeted by the FAR and Interahamwe. Other Congolese civilians, not belonging to the Tutsi community, have been massacred for not supporting the invasion of their land by foreign troops (FAR and Interahamwe).

Try to imagine your own neighborhood invaded by Interahamwe militia men. Try to imagine Interahamwe militiamen showing up every day at your doorstep to collect food, to torture and rape your family members. That is what Congolese, Tutsi and Non-Tutsi, have been experiencing since 1994. Now, think that those militiamen would be in your neighborhood because they would be chasing some of your neighbors who belong to a certain minority. How would you feel towards that minority ? Solidarity ? Compassion ? Rejection ? I guess all of them, in that same order. That is what Congolese, Tutsi and Non-Tutsi, have been experiencing since 1994.

As extreme human rights violations escalate to cause thousands of deaths, a lot of non-Tutsi Congolese started to feel that the cause of their misfortune was the presence of Tutsi in their neighborhood. A strong anti-Tutsi movement was born and made possible the rejuvenation of the Mai-Mai militias to safeguard the non-Tutsi Congolese populations. Mai-Mai did not do anything to protect Tutsi populations from Interahamwe, they even facilitated their persecution, hoping to see them leave. East-Congolese Tutsi had to organize and defend themselves before they all go extinct.

It is in that context, that the Banyamulenge, Tutsis based in South Kivu, formed a rebel movement and joined AFDL (Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire) to overthrow Mobutu’s government who had allowed Rwandese Interahamwe to invade their country to pursue their genocide plans, which had the vicious side effect of turning all other Congolese tribes against their Tutsi compatriots.

The situation got complicated when Rwandese and Ugandan troops invaded Congo in support to Laurent-Desire Kabila’s AFDL. Interahamwe managed to ally Mai-Mai and other Congolese armed groups to contest the Congolese citizenship of Congolese Tutsis. The reasoning being that foreign powers (Uganda and Rwanda) had invaded Congo to put them in charge in Kinshasa, so they can sell Congolese huge resources to their Rwandese and Ugandan “brothers”.

After Kabila seized power, he got rid of AFDL Tutsis and remove them from key government positions. Many Tutsi civilians were killed during that anti-Tutsi purge, including in the capital city of Kinshasa. In East-Congo, Tutsi had to re-organize into new groups to fight L.D. Kabila, as the survival of their community was, once again, put in jeopardy.

This time, L.D. Kabila and later his son, Joseph, would side with Interahamwe and Mai-Mai to fight Tutsi rebels, with a second objective to reduce the number of Tutsis in East-Congo. Other Hutu extremists armed groups including CNDD-FDD (now ruling party in Burundi) and FNL-Palipehutu conducted joined operations with L.D. Kabila’s forces, Mai-Mai and Interahamwe, resulting in the massacre of countless Tutsi civilians in the Kivus. Angola and Zimbabwe also came in support to Congolese governmental forces. This is often referred to as the Second Congo War (1998-2003).

In 2003, peace was signed between belligerents and a transitional government was created. A prominent Tutsi rebel, Azarias Ruberwa became vice-president. However nothing really changed for Tutsi civilians. Although the peace agreement was conditioned on the neutralization of Interahamwe, nothing happened. The Rwandese genocide perpetrators continued to recruit, accumulate wealth, expanding geographically and of course violating human rights at a larger scale.

Some Tutsi leaders were enjoying the perks of power-sharing in Kinshasa while the people they were supposed to represent were still dying like flies. This created in gap between top Tutsi leaders in Kinshasa and those who in the field were seeing they had been duped. General Laurent Nkunda is one of those who believed that Joseph Kabila was not sincere in his promise to protect Congolese populations from Interahamwe.

General Nkunda refused to disarm as long as Interahamwe and their allies would prey on Congolese Tutsi populations. He has rejected many appealing top positions in Kinshasa, as Kabila’s government has been trying to buy him out of North Kivu for a while. General Nkunda has said multiple times that nothing will get him out of North Kivu as long as his country will be occupied by armed foreign genocide perpetrators who came to destroy the precious interethnic harmony that existed between communities in Congo. He has called his fellow Congolese citizens to help him make the case against Interahamwe and demand that they be neutralized.

Some of the Congolese political leaders (mostly Tutsis) based in Northern Kivu are starting to join General Nkunda, as reported by BBC last week. It is becoming obvious that the only way out of the war cycle in East Congo is to
eliminate the Interahamwe threat. Failure to do so has caused, directly and indirectly, 2 to 3 million deaths in Congo, in addition to 1 million deaths in Rwanda. Failure to eliminate the Interahamwe will cause at least as many deaths as it has so far, as their momentum can only be strengthened by the leniency of the international community. The Interahamwe situation needs to be taken seriously and addressed with force and vigor. No matter what it will take, it will be the right thing to do. Too many lives are in the balance. The human catastrophe occurring in the East Congo,
under the UN observation, must end now. The world managed to overcome A. Hitler. I have a hard time believing that the world is failing to overcome Interahamwe…

In the African Great Lakes Region, one genocide still leads to another because those who commit genocide are not dealt with. This situation is simply not acceptable.