While the situation in Goma, Eastern Congo worsens, it is important to raise concern, among readers and among the international community.
Here is a selection of columns and research report that can enlighten about the current situation, a week after the M23 rebels took over control on the North-Kivu province, bordering Rwanda.
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First, why the Congo is not taking enough space in the news and in the public debate:
Gaza grabs the headlines as Congo once more descends into chaos
Conflict in the Middle East is overshadowing the bloody events in central Africa
- Ian Birrell
- The Observer,
"Once again, the apparently insoluble struggle between Israel and Palestine has flared up before flickering into uneasy standoff. As usual, world leaders issued fierce warnings, diplomats flew in and the media flooded the region to cover the mayhem as both sides spewed out the empty cliches of conflict. After eight days of fighting, nearly 160 people lay dead.
Meanwhile, 2,300 miles further south, events took a sharp turn for the worse in another interminable regional war. This one also involves survivors of genocide ruthlessly focused on securing their future at any cost. But the resulting conflict is far bloodier, far more brutal, far more devastating, far more destructive – yet it gains scarcely a glance from the rest of the world".
(...)
"The truth is that six times as many people have died already in the Congolese wars as died in the Rwandan genocide. Time to say never again – or does the blood of Congo not count?"
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Also in the Guardian, this column by Navy Pillay, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights:
End the impunity of Congo's war criminals
The
soldiers who marched into Goma this week are led by the world's worst
violators of human rights. They must be held responsible
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Column in the Monitor:
Why the UN must respond to rebels splitting DR Congo
http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/the-monitors-view/2012/1125/Why-the-UN-must-respond-to-rebels-splitting-DR-Congo
Before rebels known as M23 split up Congo any further, the United Nations must help this giant African nation find a unifying identity. The same goes for Rwanda.
UK Aid to Rwanda
Written evidence submitted by Dr. Phil Clark, SOAS, University of London
Executive Summary
This
submission addresses the decision by the Department for International
Development (DFID) to withhold, and subsequently to disburse, budget
support to the Government of Rwanda following allegations about its
involvement with the M23 rebel group in eastern Democratic Republic of
Congo (DRC). This paper puts forward two main arguments. First,
decisions to withhold or withdraw aid to particular states should be
based on more comprehensive and systematic evidence than that provided
by the United Nations Group of Experts (GoE) for the DRC. There are
substantial methodological and substantive shortcomings in the 2012
Group of Experts reports, on the basis of which several foreign donors
reconsidered their development aid strategies toward Rwanda.
Second,
while there are justified concerns over Rwanda’s alleged military
involvement in eastern DRC as well as domestic human rights issues in
Rwanda, the withholding or withdrawal of aid to Rwanda will do little to
address systemic causes of conflict in eastern DRC and may undermine
important political, social and economic gains which Rwanda has made
since the 1994 genocide. This risks destabilising a still fragile
situation in Rwanda, with major repercussions for the entire Great Lakes
region. On this basis, this paper advocates the continuation of UK aid
to Rwanda at the same level as before the GoE findings, alongside the
continued use of non-aid measures to address the question of Rwanda’s
alleged military involvement in the DRC and domestic human rights issues
in Rwanda.
--The latest on the BBC:
DR Congo conflict: M23 rebels urged to stop war
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-20476677A summit of four African heads of state has urged rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo to cease fire and stop threats to depose the government.
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Latest reports in the New York Times:
Congo Slips Into Chaos Again as Rebels Gain
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/26/world/africa/as-rebels-gain-congo-again-slips-into-chaos.html?ref=world
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN Published: November 25, 2012
GOMA, Democratic Republic of Congo — "The lights are out in most of Goma.
There is little water. The prison is an empty, garbage-strewn wasteland
with its rusty front gate swinging wide open and a three-foot hole
punched through the back wall, letting loose 1,200 killers, rapists,
rogue soldiers and other criminals".
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En francais :
Le Monde
RDC : le gouvernement exclut de négocier avec les rebelles avant un retrait de Goma
BBC Afrique :
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