Congo rebel leader addresses rally
RUTSHURU, Congo – A feared rebel leader sought Saturday to reassure people in territory recently seized in a lightning advance in eastern Congo, telling thousands gathered for a rally that his men intend to bring peace, not war.
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Laurent Nkunda, whose rebel army captured this town last month, offered the crowd a message of unity, playing down ethnic divisions that have fueled a long running rebellion in the central African nation.
"We are all Congolese!" he said.
Nkunda says he is fighting to protect Congo's minorities, especially ethnic Tutsis, from Hutus who fled to Congo after Rwanda's 1994 genocide. But critics say he is more interested in raw power and accuse his forces of committing multiple human rights abuses. Congo's army and other militias have also been accused of pillage, rape and extra-judicial killings.
Fighting between government forces and Nkunda's men surged in August, sparking a humanitarian crisis that has uprooted more than 250,000 people from their homes and prompted the U.N. to approve more than 3,000 more peacekeepers.
In late October, Nkunda's fighters advanced just north of Goma, 45 miles (75 kilometers) south of here, forcing Congo's army into a retreat. Rebels called a unilateral cease-fire, but sporadic clashes with the army and pro-government militias have continued.
The advance saw rebels seize the main road running north from Goma to Rutshuru, and enabled Nkunda to join his previously isolated stronghold of Kitchanga with a rebel zone further east along a volcanic mountain chain that straddles the borders of neighboring Rwanda and Uganda.
Most of the area is rural pastureland, and its greatest value lies in giving rebels a stronger hand to force the government to negotiate. Today, rebels are digging in, collecting road taxes and replacing some town officials with their own members.
Nkunda underlined his grip on power during the rally by introducing mayors who have been newly appointed to areas seized by the rebels. That was meant to drive home the point that rebels — not the government — were in control.
The rebel advance has emptied the Congolese countryside, including at least half the population of Rutshuru, with hundreds of thousands of villagers taking refuge in hastily erected camps.
Late Friday, a group of aid agencies said they had conducted a survey showing that around 63 percent of the people displaced in the latest fighting had become separated from one more close relatives. They said over 26 percent had lost contact with a child and 17 percent with a husband or wife.
"Many of those we surveyed have no idea if their children, spouses and other close relatives are alive or dead," said Brendan Gormley, chief executive of Britain's Disasters and Emergency Committee.
The U.N.'s 17,000-strong peacekeeping mission has been criticized for failing to stop the violence.
New York-based International Rescue Committee said sexual violence was on the rise against women and girls at the sprawling camps at Kibati, just north of Goma, that house around 70,000 people. Women were being raped "both in and around the camp," the agency said.
Nkunda told the stadium crowd — estimated at around 3,000 — that they cannot rely on foreign U.N. peacekeepers to protect them.
"It is not foreigners who will bring peace. It is us the Congolese," he said.
He beseeched the population to join him.
"Rise up and fight the enemies who do not want peace. I am not afraid to fight our enemies," he said. "If you do not want to fight, then clear the way."
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