Kinshasa — A special UN force in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo used helicopters Wednesday to fire on Ugandan rebels and help government troops retake the town of Kamango after an attack that killed civilians.
"South African helicopters in the UN intervention force were asked by FARDC (the DR Congo army) to give them support to recapture Kamango," said a senior officer with the UN mission to DR Congo (MONUSCO) who declined to be identified by name.
"We have already taken back Kamango," said Lieutenant-Colonel Olivier Amuli, a FARDC army spokesman in North-Kivu province, the mineral-rich but volatile region plagued by a number of armed groups.
Amuli admitted that at the time of the attack on Kamango the Congolese forces "withdrew because they were outnumbered".
The rebel attack took place before dawn, said Teddy Kataliko, head of the civil society in the Beni region where Kamango is located.
The civil organisation blamed the initial attack on the Islamist Ugandan rebel group ADF-Nalu in collaboration with Uganda's army. It is one of the oldest but least-known armed groups based in eastern DR Congo.
"We have 10 people kidnapped, 11 civilians and five soldiers wounded, and several civilians killed, as well as homes burned, by the attackers," Kataliko earlier told AFP.
The officer from Monusco also confirmed the retaking of Kamango by government troops saying "apparently the demonstration of force and the involvement of South African Rooivacks intimidated the ADF-Nalu."
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29 December 2013
Banishing Congo's Ghosts
A new level of assertiveness by the United Nations has produced a swift and fortuitous victory over the worst of the marauding militias that have terrorized eastern Democratic Republic of Congo in recent years.
Remarkably, unlike in past offensives, there have been no reports of mass rapes, pillaging, mutiny or other displays of rampant lawlessness by the Congolese military (the Forces Armées de la République Démocratique du Congo), which has long and deservedly been known as one of the world’s most undisciplined armed forces.
The Congolese government, led by President Joseph Kabila, has vowed not to become giddy from the defeat of the militia, the Rwandan-backed force known as M23, earlier this month.
It says it will now work to eliminate the complex patchwork of armies that continue to hold sway over broad swaths of this vast country’s east. A recent government memo appropriately identified one of these armies — the Forces Démocratiques de Libération du Rwanda — as a priority. This militia consists of remnants of the Interahamwe, original perpetrators of the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Neutralizing it would further delegitimize Rwanda’s nearly constant meddling on its much larger neighbor’s territory.
How did this all come about, and what lessons should be derived?
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Remarkably, unlike in past offensives, there have been no reports of mass rapes, pillaging, mutiny or other displays of rampant lawlessness by the Congolese military (the Forces Armées de la République Démocratique du Congo), which has long and deservedly been known as one of the world’s most undisciplined armed forces.
The Congolese government, led by President Joseph Kabila, has vowed not to become giddy from the defeat of the militia, the Rwandan-backed force known as M23, earlier this month.
It says it will now work to eliminate the complex patchwork of armies that continue to hold sway over broad swaths of this vast country’s east. A recent government memo appropriately identified one of these armies — the Forces Démocratiques de Libération du Rwanda — as a priority. This militia consists of remnants of the Interahamwe, original perpetrators of the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Neutralizing it would further delegitimize Rwanda’s nearly constant meddling on its much larger neighbor’s territory.
How did this all come about, and what lessons should be derived?
Continue
Four stories you may have missed in 2013
Peace in Eastern Congo
Though the guns officially went silent in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s civil war back in 2003, the uneasy peace administered by several African nations left dozens of rebel groups and violent separatists vying for control of the country’s territory and bountiful resources. Since then, the DRC has been plagued by a variety of regional conflicts and uprisings. Among the region’s more organized – and violent – militias was the March 23 Movement (M23), the armed offshoot of a separatist political party based in the Kivu region of eastern Congo. For over a year, the rebel group terrorized eastern Congo, with its crowning achievement being the 11-day seizure and occupation of the provincial capital of Goma during the fall of 2012.
Yet rather than sink back into a violent abyss, Congo took a hopeful turn in 2013 when several African leaders met alongside U.N. officials in Nairobi to hammer out a framework for addressing the chaos. The plan promised a revamped and more aggressive U.N. peacekeeping force to work alongside the Congolese army in its efforts to root out and rein in separatist groups.
The plan appears to have worked, as a campaign spearheaded in late August by the combined forces repelled and ultimately pushed M23 rebels to the negotiating table. The peace, should it hold, is not only a big victory for the Congolese military, but for U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who took a special interest in quelling the carnage in eastern Congo.
Though the defeat of the M23 is an undeniable accomplishment for Kinshasa, many obstacles remain. Among them, says Christoph Vogel, a researcher who monitors DRC militias, are the many other militias operating around the country. To subdue these groups, a more holistic approach – one that addresses longstanding land disputes and distribution – may be necessary. Otherwise, lingering grievances will only lead to later clashes between militants fighting under new flags and acronyms.
“M23 was a very conventional opponent,” explains Vogel. “Other groups will be harder to tackle; their guerilla-like outfit will lead them to tactically disperse instead of facing proper battlefield confrontation.”
Continue
Though the guns officially went silent in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s civil war back in 2003, the uneasy peace administered by several African nations left dozens of rebel groups and violent separatists vying for control of the country’s territory and bountiful resources. Since then, the DRC has been plagued by a variety of regional conflicts and uprisings. Among the region’s more organized – and violent – militias was the March 23 Movement (M23), the armed offshoot of a separatist political party based in the Kivu region of eastern Congo. For over a year, the rebel group terrorized eastern Congo, with its crowning achievement being the 11-day seizure and occupation of the provincial capital of Goma during the fall of 2012.
Yet rather than sink back into a violent abyss, Congo took a hopeful turn in 2013 when several African leaders met alongside U.N. officials in Nairobi to hammer out a framework for addressing the chaos. The plan promised a revamped and more aggressive U.N. peacekeeping force to work alongside the Congolese army in its efforts to root out and rein in separatist groups.
The plan appears to have worked, as a campaign spearheaded in late August by the combined forces repelled and ultimately pushed M23 rebels to the negotiating table. The peace, should it hold, is not only a big victory for the Congolese military, but for U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who took a special interest in quelling the carnage in eastern Congo.
Though the defeat of the M23 is an undeniable accomplishment for Kinshasa, many obstacles remain. Among them, says Christoph Vogel, a researcher who monitors DRC militias, are the many other militias operating around the country. To subdue these groups, a more holistic approach – one that addresses longstanding land disputes and distribution – may be necessary. Otherwise, lingering grievances will only lead to later clashes between militants fighting under new flags and acronyms.
“M23 was a very conventional opponent,” explains Vogel. “Other groups will be harder to tackle; their guerilla-like outfit will lead them to tactically disperse instead of facing proper battlefield confrontation.”
Continue
Congo: Soldiers Retake Town Seized by Rebel Group
Soldiers in the Democratic Republic of Congo, backed by United Nations peacekeepers, have taken back a town in eastern Congo occupied by a Ugandan rebel group, a government spokesman said Thursday. The spokesman, Lambert Mende, said that the army took back the town of Kamango on Wednesday, hours after it was seized by a rebel group from Uganda that is now operating in Congo. At least 22 people were killed in the operation, mostly civilians, Mr. Mende said.
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U.N. scrambles to send more troops to South Sudan
More than 7,000 peacekeepers are already in South Sudan. The Security Council voted unanimously Tuesday to increase the number by more than 5,000, redeploying them from missions in other African countries such as Liberia, Ivory Coast and the Democratic Republic of Congo as soon as possible. The council also increased the size of an 800-member U.N. police force in South Sudan by more than 400.
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At least 21, including women and baby, killed in Congo's east
Comment: An example of how not all of Eastern Congo's problems are home grown.
The killings highlighted the challenges still facing Congo's army and U.N. forces attempting to pacify Congo's mineral-rich east, which has remained a lawless patchwork of rebel strongholds and militia fiefdoms for nearly two decades.
U.N.-backed government forces won a rare victory last month against the Tutsi-dominated M23 rebels, the region's most serious uprising in years.
But dozens of armed groups still hold ground in the rugged mountains along Congo's eastern border with Rwanda and Uganda.
Jaribu Muliwavyo, a member of North Kivu's provincial assembly from Beni, told Reuters he believed the Allied Democratic Forces, a rebel group that emerged in the 1990s in opposition to the Ugandan government, were behind the attack.
The Ugandan government says the group, also known by the acronym ADF-NALU, is allied to elements of Somalia's al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab movement.
"ADF-NALU has been moving for the last two or three weeks and this locality was in their route. ADF-NALU controls this area," Muliwavyo told Reuters by telephone. "It is terrorism, pure and simple."
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Let Slip the Drones of Peace
The United Nations proudly announced on Tuesday the deployment of its first peacekeeping drone, an unmanned aerial vehicle that will be used to monitor the forested border between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda, looking for fighters from the defeated M23 rebel group and other militias.
Hervé Ladsous, the United Nations under secretary general for peacekeeping, was present as the craft took off for the first time from an airport in Goma, the Congolese city that was recaptured from the rebels with the help of United Nations troops in recent months. As my colleagues Nicholas Kulish and Somini Sengupta reported, that more robust use of force around Goma has earned the international organization rare praise.
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Hervé Ladsous, the United Nations under secretary general for peacekeeping, was present as the craft took off for the first time from an airport in Goma, the Congolese city that was recaptured from the rebels with the help of United Nations troops in recent months. As my colleagues Nicholas Kulish and Somini Sengupta reported, that more robust use of force around Goma has earned the international organization rare praise.
Continue
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