Towards peace in Congo

Hopes for an end to the hostilities in the Democratic Republic of Congo rise as the rebel factions agree for a dialogue with President Joseph Kabila.

AT LAST there is cause for optimism about the chances of peace in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Another round of blood-letting was expected following the assassination of President Laurent D. Kabila in January, but things seem to have taken a turn for the better in the past couple of months. Joseph Kabila, who replaced his slain father as President, has turned out to be a mature leader, willing to forget the animosities of the past and work towards ending the civil war.

A high-level team representing the United Nations Security Council, which was in the region recently, has returned with the impression that countries supporting the warring factions in the Congo (Angolo, Namibia and Zimbabwe support the Kinshasa government against the rebels backed by Uganda and Rwanda) are committed to bringing an end to the war. In the first week of May, all the Congolese factions agreed to resume dialogue. Congolese Liberation Movement (MLC) leader Jean Pierre-Bemba, who is supported by the Ugandan troops, signalled his willingness to return to the negotiating table when he told the U.N. mission that his forces would withdraw from areas under his control. (The U.N. team told newspersons in Kinshasa in early June that the MLC started withdrawing from positions in northern DRC on June 1, paving the way for a U.N. peace-keeping mission.)

In May, Kabila announced the lifting of the ban on political parties and agreed to the appointment of Sir Ketumile Masire the facilitator for the inter-Congolese dialogue, scheduled to take place in mid-July. The dialogue is aimed at bringing the Kabila government, the armed and the unarmed opposition, and the civil society to the negotiating table.

Under the Lusaka accords of 1999, all parties engaged in the conflict were to start disengaging under the supervision of U.N. peace-keepers. The Lusaka Ceasefire Agreement was signed by the DRC along with Angola, Namibia, Rwanda, Uganda and Zimbabwe. The agreement provided for an end to the hostilities and for the holding of an inter-Congolese dialogue.

Uganda has already announced its decision to withdraw its troops. But Rwanda, which backs one of the rebel factions, has remained non-committal. The Tutsi leadership in Kigali wants iron-clad guarantees that its interests would be safeguarded after the withdrawal of Rwandan troops. The Interhamwe, the Hutu militia based in Congo, remains to be disarmed. The Hutu militia is not reconciled to the fact that Tutsi minority rules in both Rwanda and Burundi. Rwandan strongman Paul Kagame assured the U.N. team that once his country's security concerns were addressed, his troops would withdraw.

The U.N. mission in the Congo (MONUC) had also visited Burundi, although it is not a signatory to the Lusaka accords. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan maintained that this was an acknowledgement of the linkage between the conflict in the Congo and the politics in neighbouring countries.

MONUC has already deployed 490 military observers, supported by 1,660 troops, for verifying the disengagement. Angola, Zimbabwe and Namibia, which rushed to the DRC's support during an insurgency in 1998, have given assurances that they would withdraw their troops immediately after the armies of Uganda and Rwanda left the Congolese territory.

The four-year-old civil war has been one of Africa's bloodiest in the past 50 years. International aid agencies have described the death roll, said to exceed two million, as the largest ever recorded in an African conflict. The DRC conflict has been described as an African "world war". At one time, almost all the countries in the region were involved in the war in varying degrees. Most of the deaths have been caused by starvation and disease as a result of the war. Joseph Kabila has frequently emphasised that the huge toll has shown that the "stupid war verges on genocide".

According to aid agencies, the mortality rate is high among children. A British aid group has documented that in many parts of eastern Congo, where most of the fighting is concentrated, the death rates are two and a half times higher than the birth rates. Before the war started in 1998, the birth rate in the region was growing by around 3 per cent.

Congo's population is estimated at around 50 million. One-third of it is said to be vulnerable to starvation. Two million Congolese have been already rendered homeless by the civil war. Very little humanitarian aid is reaching the Congo. Kofi Annan admitted that international assistance to the human catastrophe was "unacceptably low with only 20 per cent of the 2001 Consolidated Appeal for $139.4 million being funded."

As the civil war raged, the country was systematically looted. A U.N Panel of Experts on the Illegal Exploitation of Natural Resources and Other Forms of Wealth in the Democratic Republic of Congo has, in its report submitted in April, accused Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi of plundering Congo's rich mineral deposits and natural resources at an "alarming rate". The Security Council has urged the three countries to end the illegal exploitation.

The report said the plundering was two-pronged - through "mass-scale looting and the systematic and systemic exploitation of natural resources". It concluded that "key individual actors including top Army commanders and businessmen on the one hand, and government structures on the other, have been the engines of this exploitation". Top Ugandan Army officers enriched themselves and massive financial resources were made available to the Rwandan Army, it said.

The panel recommended that sanctions be imposed against the countries and individuals involved in those rapacious deeds. It also recommended that preventive measures be adopted to "avoid a recurrence of the current situation". However, the three countries named in the report have been very critical of the findings. The Ugandan government, however, plans to establish an independent judicial commission to investigate the charges, one of which is that Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni's son and brother are involved in the looting. Major-General Salem Saleh, Museveni's brother, is accused of stealing diamonds, coal tar, gold, timber and ivory. Uganda and Rwanda virtually destroyed the city of Kisangani in July 2000, in their fight for control over the mineral resources. An Indian company in Surat is among those listed in the report for illegally importing diamonds from the war zone.

Zimbabwean and Namibian companies have stakes in the cobalt, diamond and copper industries while the state-owned Angolan oil company was allowed a major role in the production and distribution of petroleum and petroleum products in Congo. The countries supporting the government in Kinshasa have been given the benefit of the doubt as their business dealings are with the government.

The report has enhanced the new DRC President's international credibility. It has given the stamp of legitimacy to the presence of the troops of Angola, Zimbabwe and Namibia on the Congolese territory while describing the presence of forces from Uganda and Rwanda as "illegal aggression". Also, the United States has not come to the defence of its friends in Kampala and Kigali this time. The general impression in Africa is that Uganda and Rwanda were given the green signal by the U.S. when they embarked on their Congo adventure. The Bush administration in Washington is reluctant to play an activist role in Africa and seems disposed to let France emerge as an important player in its old area of influence.

Although the prospects for peace in the region have risen, it may take some time for the fighting to end. The withdrawal of outside forces will have to be in stages as Angolan and Zimbabwean troops start the process of disarming the Hutu militias. Angola's actions in Congo were to a large extent dictated by the alliance between the rebel UNITA forces and those opposed to Kabila. An opposition victory would have put Angola's oil-producing region of Gabinda under threat. Zimbabwe and Namibia had rushed to Kabila's help owing mostly to ideological affinity. Laurent Kabila, Robert Mugabe and Sam Nujoma were comrades-in-arms during the long-drawn-out struggle for decolonisation in the continent.

A positive beginning has been made with the opening up of the Congo river for trade and travel. The river is the main artery for commerce as the roads in this huge slice of Africa are in absolute disrepair.