I would not ordinarily offer an analysis from Reuters, unedited and provided by MONUC, the UN Mission to DR Congo. However, what follows below my commentary is a fairy good description of the tensions in the volatile Virunga border region between Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and Uganda. The main caveat on the Reuters release is the biased subtext against Tutsi General Laurent Nkunda.
Nkunda has always been an enigma. It is true that remnants of the Interahamwe genocidairres infest regions of eastern Congo. So do innocent Hutus and Tutsis alike. One must separate the civilian population from the armed militias when speaking about this region and not paint a false portrait with a brush soaked in the colors of ethnic tensions.
As a MONUC accredited journalist in DRC, we tried to reach Nkunda, but were stymied by conservation interests that have proven to be fronts for multi-national interests in Virunga. We did speak with former friends and classmates of Nkunda, who describe a thoughtful, scholarly, even “god-fearing” man who has great respect for the natural world. Nkunda professes to be protecting the Tutsi population from atrocities. There is probably some truth in this. That being said, Nkunda is a military man and military men kill.
Congolese have good reason to question "conservation" activities
The mercenary army known as Wild Life Direct (WD), which operates under the cloak of a US based charity, duly registered with the IRS in Washington DC, has miraculously escaped the same scrutiny. WD is clearly better armed than Nkunda, or even the United Nations troops we encountered in DRC. Take a good look at the photo accompanying this article and realize that your tax dollars are paying for the well-oiled machine guns owned and operated by WD.
It is anyone’s guess why human rights groups have not investigated the tactics employed by Wild Life Direct against innocent villagers in Virunga. Go to www.vonplanta.net and find “Guns For Hire: Congo 2006.” Watch as a starving fisherman has a wire snare wrapped around his neck by the “hero” Congo Rangers who were recently feted by Newsweek and its sister publication the Washington Post.
If you can stomach it, watch the urine run between his legs into the African soil as the fisherman sits crying in absolute, stark terror. Your tax dollars pay for this.
It might be a good thing that Nkunda has driven Richard Leakey’s mercenary “conservationists” from Virunga. Wild Life Direct has successfully mounted a massive public relations campaign against the poorest of the poor, blaming “charcoal gatherers,” Mai-Mai, and any other dispossessed they can name for the recent gorilla killings.
The fact is that the gorilla killings began when Wild Life Direct set up shop in Virunga, along with a board of directors that deserves scrutiny. Walter Kansteiner III is also on the board of the African Wildlife Foundation, which sponsors Wild Life Direct. Consider this, contributed by keith harmon snow (www.allthingspass.com):
“The Democratic Republic of Congo has the world’s purest and largest deposits of strategic minerals, including gold, coltan, niobium, cobalt, heterogenite and columbite. Heterogenite exports coming out of Congo are alone valued at between $260 million (at $20/lb.) and $408 million (at $30/lb.) per month.
“The Great Lakes region is also seeing an assault by oil and gas companies affiliated with mercenary firms: this may be a partial impetus to “conserving” and “protecting” the Lake Albert basin and the Virungas. Heritage Oil and Gas, Tullow Oil and Hartmann Oil are exploiting oil reserves on both sides of the DRC border, while Lake Kivu is being targeted for major natural gas (methane) production by Rwanda. The region is one contiguous oil field—the Semliki basin—under the Great Lakes and north through Darfur to the Red Sea.
“Among other State Department posts he held, Walter Kansteiner III was the Africa specialist on the Secretary of State’s Policy Planning Staff under President Clinton, and he worked on the Department of Defense Strategic Minerals Task Force. The Clinton Administration was deeply involved in the conflicts in central Africa from 1993-2001.”
Kansteiner is on the Board of Directors of the Corporate Council on Africa—the “who’s who” of corporate exploitation in Africa piloted by Israeli American diamond magnate Maurice Tempelsman. He is a director of the African Development Foundation, Sierra Rutile Mining, and Moto Gold Mines. Sierra Rutile has a long and sordid history of involvement with mercenaries and mining in war torn Sierra Leone; Moto Gold Mines is now operating in the killing fields of DRC’s blood-drenched Orientale Province just north of the Virungas.
Congolese animal rights groups have fingered a thriving trade in orphan gorillas which has operated literally under the nose of the Congo rangers of Wild Life Direct. The smugglers’ lair, Camp Vodo, was identified as being a scant fifteen meters from WD headquarters near Rumangabo in the Virungas.
With that in mind apply some critical thinking (a lost art) to the Reuter’s release, which follows.
KINSHASA, Oct 8 (Reuters) - Congolese renegade general Laurent Nkunda on Monday abandoned a month-old ceasefire in an eastern border province, blaming attacks by the government, which in turn accused him of pushing the country towards war.
Nkunda's announcement heralded more conflict and suffering in Democratic Republic of Congo's North Kivu province, where fighting between his soldiers and government troops have already forced tens of thousands of civilians from their homes.
The province, which borders Uganda and Rwanda, has long been a tinderbox of ethnic tensions and clashes between the army and rival rebel and militia groups.
After fighting in the east in August and early September, the United Nations Mission in Congo (MONUC) announced on Sept. 6 a limited truce between the rebel Tutsi general and the army.
But fresh clashes between the two sides broke out last week and over the weekend, and U.N. military sources said fighting continued on Monday in several parts of North Kivu.
Nkunda accused the government army, which said it killed at least 35 of his fighters last week, of attacking his positions.
"There is no ceasefire. ... We have told ourselves we will no longer stand with our arms crossed while people are dying. We must react. We are soldiers," Nkunda told Reuters by telephone.
"MONUC thinks there is a ceasefire, but we've abandoned it."
In response, Congo's Defense Minister Chikez Diemu accused Nkunda, who says he is defending the interests of Congo's Tutsi ethnic group, of trying to "Balkanise" the country.
"He's playing a dangerous game. Now he's pushing us towards war," the minister told Reuters.
He said the government had given the rebel general until Oct. 15 to stop hostilities and integrate his forces into the Congolese national army, or face tough action.
"We'll catch him like a mouse in a hole," Diemu said.
He added Congo would implement measures agreed with its Great Lakes neighbors Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi. He did not spell these out but the states have been discussing cooperation to counter rebel groups operating in eastern Congo.
ETHNIC ENMITY
Some of the recent North Kivu fighting took place in Virunga National Park, Africa's oldest park, forcing rangers to flee and putting endangered mountain gorillas there at risk.
The U.N. mission in Congo, which has a 17,000 strong peacekeeping force in the former Belgian colony, said it was closely monitoring the renewed fighting in North Kivu province.
"There's some fighting going on now in Masisi (district). It's taking place in three locations, including Karuba and Ngungu," a U.N. military spokesman Major P.K. Tiwari said.
Nkunda, who led a 2004 rebellion, accuses Congo President Joseph Kabila's government and armed forces of supporting Rwandan Hutu rebels -- traditional ethnic enemies of the Tutsi.
The largely Hutu Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) rebels are accused of involvement in Rwanda's 1994 genocide that saw the slaughter of 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus by a Hutu-led government and ethnic militias.
Kabila denies supporting the FDLR.
The North Kivu fighting has displaced tens of thousands of civilians and foreign relief agencies have warned of a fresh humanitarian catastrophe in Congo, which is still recovering from a 1998-2003 war that killed some 4 million people, mostly from hunger and disease generated by conflict.
A January accord raised hopes for peace by integrating his rebel soldiers into mixed national army brigades, but Nkunda's men abandoned the mixed brigades in August, amid mutual accusations of violence and discrimination.
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