Time to stop courting Kagame

Instability and human rights abuses are nothing new in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)’s volatile East. Yet familiarity will not bring any comfort to those affected by the turbulent events of recent weeks, which hit new heights on Friday as troops loyal to rebel leader Bosco Ntaganda sent hundreds of DRC soldiers fleeing into neighbouring Uganda, killing a UN peacekeeper in the process.

Ntaganda, an indicted war criminal, is infamous throughout the region and the world for the rapes, massacres and recruitment of child soldiers frequently undertaken by his men. Comparisons to Joseph Kony are by no means an exaggeration of his ruthlessness: Ntaganda is reported to have once overseen the butchering of some one hundred and fifty civilians in a single day. Those living under his control tonight have every reason to be fearful.

Over the years Ntaganda’s loyalties have shifted, yet he has always retained strong ties with Rwandan rebel leader- turned president Paul Kagame and his Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). Ntaganda, also an ethnic Tutsi, served under Kagame when the RPF overthrew the genocidal Hutu government in 1994. In subsequent years he operated in the DRC, eventually integrating his force into the official army in 2009.

In recent months however, Ntaganda has broken ranks and, accompanied by a band of approximately six hundred troops known as M23, has seized control of territory outside the town of Goma, displacing thousands of people in the process. Despite the chaos and human rights abuses unfolding, Kagame’s government has covertly provided a stream of weapons, recruits and equipment to bolster Ntaganda’s position, increasing the prospect of an even more protracted and bloody conflict.

Perhaps one of the most disturbing aspects of the current situation was the revelation last month that the USA was blocking the release of a UN report detailing Rwanda’s involvement. Yet such behaviour, whilst wholly unacceptable, is hardly surprising. Kagame has long exploited guilt over the international community’s utter failure to act during the Rwandan Genocide, in order to foster a healthy worldwide support base for his administration, despite its utterly abusive actions both inside Rwanda and across the Congolese border.

Now, with Ntaganda flexing his muscles further, using Rwandan troops and guns to fuel further conflict in the DRC, it is time for the USA and other Kagame-friendly states to put real pressure on the despotic President. Rwanda is expected to take a seat on the UN Security Council next year – a good starting point would be to block this at all costs, until Kagame ceases his support for one of Africa’s most brutal war criminals.

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The DRC in danger

The angry protests of Congolese exiles from Toronto to London over the past few days give just a small hint of the tensions currently building in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) – where the results of the state’s turbulent election will be released in the coming hours.

The outcome is already clear: with more than 90% of the votes counted, incumbent president Joseph Kabila, leads his closest rival Etienne Tshisekedi by 48%-34%.  Now, supporters of Tshisekedi and his Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS) are crying foul play and threatening huge street protests when the result is formally announced. 

They claim that Kabila orchestrated vote rigging, including the distribution of pre-marked ballot papers, whilst using violence to intimidate members of the opposition.  Such accusations are, at least in part, backed up by various international bodies, including the EU whose observers cited serious irregularities during the voting; the Carter Centre, which highlighted forced voting and destroyed ballot papers; and Human Rights watch, which has attributed the majority of the eighteen election-related deaths confirmed so far to Kabila’s troops – urging him to reign them in and emphasising that “elections don’t give soldiers an excuse to randomly shoot at crowds.”

For his part Tshisekedi is still talking to the UN-backed mediation team and has stopped short of calling for his people to come out onto the streets, stating that he will accept any decision made at the ballot box, whichever way it goes.  However, he is concurrently demanding a full breakdown of turnout and vote distribution from all sixty-three thousand polling stations; something that the government is currently unwilling to provide.  The request itself is perfectly legitimate, but continued obstruction by Kabila’s authorities, or indeed the detail of any data released, may well stoke the anger felt by UDPS supporters.  

With such a severe potential for unrest, some are welcoming the fact that the results have so-far been delayed for forty-eight hours, suggesting that the cooling period may in fact be beneficial and could potentially ease tensions.  However, others have taken the opportunity to flee the DRC into the neighbouring Republic of Congo, before what they fear will be a slide into total chaos and a proliferation of the scenes that played out towards the end of the election campaign, when machete-wielding rivals clashed in the capital.

Both citizens and international observers are well aware that, as demonstrated in Kenya during 2007, elections can spark mass violence in even the most stable of states. For the DRC, which is less than a decade out of a brutal civil war that saw three million killed, and which experienced weeks of street battles and loss of life after its last election, the stakes are even higher.

Technorati Tags: Democratic Republic of Congo,DRC,election,violence,rigging,Joseph Kabila,Etienne Tshisekedi,EU,UN,Carter Centre,Human Rights Watch,fraud,Kenya,refugees,dispute,protests,electoral,ballot papers

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Democracy and crisis

Tragically, many of the anxieties and fears leading up to the Democratic Republic of Congo’s second ever election appear to now be materialising.  Already branded ‘chaos’, today’s poll has been marred by scenes that bring the very concept of Congolese democracy into stark question. 

Secessionist gunmen in Lubumbashi attacked polling stations and official vehicles, taking lives and destroying electoral material.  Elsewhere a combination of poor weather and chaotic organisation led to polling stations opening late, reportedly prompting would-be-voters to burn down as many as three.  Meanwhile rival groups of supporters have clashed, police have fired tear gas and the day’s death toll, currently standing at four, looks set to rise as others lie injured in hospital.

This mayhem follows a weekend of violence in which leading opposition candidate Etienne Tshisekedi was blocked from attending his final campaign rally by police, as rival groups took part in fatal confrontations in the capital, Kinshasa.  Eventually Tshisekedi was escorted through the streets by supporters wielding guns and machetes, whilst across the city, President Joseph Kabila’s bodyguards are purported to have shot at bystanders.    

Yet despite the disorder and bloodshed, there are also optimistic signs.  In many parts of the DRC – which covers the same landmass as Western Europe, suffers from chronic infrastructure problems and is plagued by more armed groups that perhaps any other African country- voting has been remarkably peaceful, if not particularly efficient.  Inspirationally, over thirty million voters are heading out with a mix of pride and bravery, hoping to shape the DRC’s future for the better and finally move away from the cycle of dictatorship and conflict that many have know for all of their lives.

This was never going to be an easy or straightforward election – but the mass participation and determination of the vast majority of citizens may still make it an historic one.

Nevertheless, there remains the risk that all of this could be undone by the behaviour of candidates once the result is announced.  After the 2006 election, then opposition leader Jean-Pierre Bemba (now being tried for War Crimes at the International Criminal Court), accused Joseph Kabila of stealing the vote, and dragged the country into weeks of bloody violence.  This time around there is already talk of ballot box stuffing; and no sign that either Tshisekedi or Kabila will give any ground in the case of a questionable or disputed result..

The imminent expiration of Kabila’s constitutionally-mandated presidential term adds a further layer of tension.  If a clear winner has not emerged by the first week of December the DRC will effectively be left with no official president, creating a dangerous political vacuum.

For these reasons it is essential that, after the papers are collected, all sides behave responsibly; allowing genuine scrutiny of the result, whilst drawing a clear line between highlighting discrepancies and encouraging street violence. It is also crucial for the international community to provide whatever active support is needed for the twenty-two-thousand-strong UN peacekeeping force that is gearing up to deal with post-election clashes.  These are no small asks, but without them the DRC may see much more chaos before it ever sees democracy.

Technorati Tags: Democratic Republic of Congo,DRC,Congo,election,Joseph Kabila,Etienne Tshisekedi,UN,peackeepers,clashes,violence,2006,Jean-Pierre Bemba,vote,poll,corruption,Kinshasa,ballot box stuffing,rigged,weather,attacks,Lubumbashi

DRC- the ultimate test

Campaigning has officially begun for the Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) November 28th election, with eleven presidential candidates and over eighteen thousand parliamentary candidates vying for some thirty-two million votes.

The election, dubbed the DRC’s “ultimate test” by the International Crisis Group, will be the state’s second since the formal end of its brutal civil war in 2003.  The first, in 2006, sustained the presidency of Joseph Kabila, who took the reigns of power un-elected when his father, President Laurent-Désiré Kabila, was assassinated five years earlier.  The 2006 election, cited at the time as the most important in on the continent since Mandela won the South African Presidency, was marred by fatal clashes between rival groups of supporters, and claims that Kabila had won through corruption and intimidation.

This time around the stakes are even higher.

For if it passes off relatively smoothly and peacefully, this could be a historic milestone in the DRC’s long, hard road away from its violent past.  On the other hand, ethnic and political violence or disputed results could pull the state further back into crisis, undoing the small, though tangible, steps towards stability made during recent years.

Ominously, the latter course is looking increasingly possible.  A recent survey reveals huge discrepancies in voter registration, favouring Kabila; while human rights groups have expressed their concerns about hate speech from all candidates, exacerbating ethnic tensions.  Many NGOs have called for a UN rapid reaction force to deal with potential flashpoints, in light of clashes between supporters of Kabila and his main rival, former Prime Minister Étienne Tshisekedi, which have already cost several lives.

With a vast number of militias continuing to operate, particularly in the East of the DRC, on-going abuses by the official army, the unprecedented murder of five aid workers at the beginning of October and Kambila long-suggesting that he would like to see UN peacekeepers leave, the election may potentially provide the spark that reignites wider conflict.

Still, foreign officials have warned against creating a self-fulfilling prophecy; arguing that writing off the election before people even start to vote would be a dangerous move.  They are right of course, but this should not undermine the importance and urgency of the situation. 

The UN peacekeeping force (MONUC) would be wise to head the calls for a rapid reaction force.  They should also channel resources into ensuring that women can safely reach the polling stations; mass rape has become an abhorrent fixture in the DRC’s conflicts, leaving many understandably terrified of casting their votes in such a volatile climate.

There must also be clear political pressure from those states supporting the DRC economically, emphasising the need for presidential candidates in particular to abide be the electoral framework and tell their supporters in no uncertain terms that any violence or intimidation is unacceptable. 

Beyond this the electoral authorities must be supported, by all sides as well as by the international community, in the huge logistical challenges that they face.  Organising an election in a state the size of Western Europe, with some of the worst infrastructure in the world, will inevitably run into problems.  It is critical that these are not allowed not boil over into accusations of foul play.

The people of the DRC have faced some of the worst and most prolonged suffering seen by any state in Africa.  Next month might be a chance to move on.  It will be the ultimate test for politicians domestically and around the world, to prevent it from becoming something even worse. 

Technorati Tags: DRC,Democratic Republic of Congo,election,2011,violence,UN,peacekeeping,Étienne Tshisekedi,Joseph Kabila,Laurent-Désiré Kabila

USA vs LRA

2011 may prove to be a key year in the struggle against the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), the brutal group led by convicted War Criminal Joseph Kony, that has waged a twenty-four-year campaign of terror throughout Central Africa. 

Intermittently professing the intention of overthrowing Ugandan dictator Yoweri Museveni and setting up a state based on the Ten Commandments (though briefly flirting with Islam), Kony’s rag-tag band of devotees and press-ganged child soldiers has long shed any vaguely coherent objective; simply rampaging through Uganda, South Sudan, the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo, carrying out a horrifying string of human rights abuses, including looting, rape, mutilation and thousands of murders.  Three factors however, may soon bring this terror to a close.  

Firstly, the secession of South Sudan in July, has given the Sudan Peoples’ iberation Movement (SPLM) – a long avowed enemy of the LRA, the strength and status of an official government, as well as potentially reinforcing Kony’s physical detachment from his backers in Khartoum, who as late as 2010 were allegedly using the LRA as proxies to attack opposition in Darfur.

Secondly, an advanced crisis-mapping project has now been launched, compiling information on the LRA’s scattered activities across Central Africa’s porous borders, raising international awareness and providing unprecedentedly detailed data for the governments and NGOs seeking to track and ultimately halt the brutality.

Perhaps, most importantly of all however, Barak Obama this week announced the deployment of one hundred US troops to train and support the four national governments combating the LRA. 

Though only mandated to engage in combat for the purpose of self defence, this force will be working with units actively pursuing Kony, marking the most significant external involvement to date and a distinct strengthening of international efforts to crush the LRA once and for all.  Possibly the key effect of this will be ingraining a level of professionalism and commitment that has been lacking from previous regional efforts due to a range of incompetencies and hidden agendas.

Resolve, the key human rights group working to end LRA atrocities has welcomed the move, highlighting the likelihood of quicker responses, better intelligence and more focussed US assistance.  Still, that hasn’t stopped certain other quarters from criticising the deployment, drawing parallel's with the tragic 1990s US mission to Somalia, pointing out that the LRA is already at its weakest point to date and questioning whether the conflict is even relevant to US national interests.

To a great extent, these objections are fallacious.  Unlike Somalia, this is to be a limited non-combat mission, which inevitably poses risks, but to nowhere near the level of the circumstances that led to Black Hawk Down.  In terms of the LRA’s perceived weakness, whilst the group is seemingly now fragmented and boasts nowhere near the thousands of troops that it once did, it is still capable of carrying out appalling massacres as demonstrated just last February.  It is also worth noting that LRA weakness has been highlighted for years, yet still it lumbers on. 

As for ‘national interest’, one only needs to highlight that halting the systematic rape of young girls, conscription of young boys and murder of whole villages is – or least should be – in every state’s interest, no matter where in the world it is taking place.

Still, there are are some serious questions to be answered: such as those around the dangers of training Ugandan forces known to contain political death squads, Democratic Republic of Congo forces known to have committed mass rape and Central African Republic forces guilty of torture and enforced disappearances.  Could the US involvement ultimately end up improving the capacity of these armies to terrorise their own populations?

There is also the long-term issue to consider: other militias operating in Central Africa, particularly in the East of the Democratic Republic of Congo, are just as dangerous as abhorrent as the LRA.  What action, if any, will subsequently be taken to disarm them?

The USA must tread carefully, but Obama is taking a risk in order to draw a line under one of the most barbaric chapters of African history and for this he must be commended.  Some are already questioning US motives, particularly whether this is a return favour for Uganda’s work against Al-Shabab in Somalia or part of an ongoing trend based around targeting particularly dangerous or loathed individuals.  Though, whilst these questions must be asked, they will ultimately be of little relevance to those who have lived in fear of the LRA for two decades, if and once Kony and his men are finally stopped.

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Standing up to a saviour

Very few have watched Hotel Rwanda and not been moved by its graphic depiction of the 1994 genocide or by the selfless heroism of the protagonist, Paul Rusesabagina. Despite the inevitable ‘Hollywoodisation’, the story was largely accurate and Mr. Rusesabagina can rightly be credited with saving the lives of some 1200 Tutsis and moderate Hutus whilst the international community stood by and watched one of the worst crimes against humanity since the holocaust. It is a strange state of affairs then – that he is now being branded an “enemy of the state” by Rwanda’s post-genocide government; led by the very men who brought the slaughter to an end.

The move has resulted from Mr. Rusesabagina’s criticism of Rwandan President Paul Kagame – criticism that was both brave and justified. Since leading the Tutsi-dominated Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) to victory against the genocidal Hutu-led dictatorship in 1994 Kagame has, like so many African leaders before him, turned into exact kind of tyrant he professed to stand against. The media is ruthlessly suppressed, extrajudicial killings of opponents have become commonplace and democratic freedoms have been crushed to an extent that the Economist -without exaggeration- noted to be worse than Zimbabwe. More disturbingly still –a recent UN report highlighted how during the 1990s Kagame’s forces were been involved in systematic massacres of Hutu civilians over the border in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) that may have amounted to genocide. It is becoming clearer by the day that the man once viewed as a liberator and savior from genocide is in fact a genocidal dictator himself.

It is against this background that Mr. Rusesabagina recently described Rwanda as “a big open prison where Kagame is the chief warden.” The comments led to his home being ransacked before he was outrageously denounced in the Rwandan media as a supporter Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) – a Hutu Power group derived from those who perpetrated the 1994 genocide and which continues to stage armed attacks in the DRC. Of course, the accusation that Mr. Rusesabagina is supporting the very group he risked his life and his family to save people from, is utterly nonsensical – but it was also expected. It has long been a tactic of Kagame’s regime to accuse any outspoken opponents of being participants, supporters or revisionists of the genocide.

Unfortunately, because of obvious sensitivities surrounding this, the international community has so far been slow to criticise the man who brought the genocide to an end, so aid and political support (including from form Prime Minister Tony Blair as an advisor to Kagame) continue to poor in. However, the attacks on a humanitarian hero -who is well known to Westerners through Hotel Rwanda and has received such award as the Presidential Freedom Medal – may prove a bridge too far. And if it does bring about change in the way states deal with the RPF authorities it certainly won’t be before time. Kagame saved Rwanda from genocide- but now the world must save Rwanda from him.

Catching Kony

Saturday’s announcement that the Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda and Sudan will form a joint military force to combat the Lord’s Resistance Army was understandably widely welcomed. The LRA has wreaked havoc across the four states for twenty years, conscripting thousands of children and forcing them to commit horrendous massacres. Stemming from the ethnic Acholi group (a people from Northern Uganda abusively oppressed by successive dictators), its deranged founder Joesph Kony (who remains leader to this day), combines militant Acholi opposition to Uganda’s brutal leader Yoweri Museveni with a warped form of Christian fundamentalism. Ironically the LRA’s actions are both the antithesis of what most would regard as Christian and have caused as much, if not more suffering for the Acholi people than Museveni’s regime.

Despite being the avowed enemies of numerous governments and subject to arrest warrants issued by the ICC for Crimes Against Humanity, Kony and his cronies still run riot as free men -partly due to the porous borders of central Africa and the lack of cooperation between the states in which they operate. This latest initiative, involving intelligence sharing and a mobile multi-national force estimated to include some one thousand soldiers, is designed to solve the impasse and bring the LRA leaders to justice. Unfortunately, it may not be that simple.

Numerous other factors, beyond practical and logistical complications, have long facilitated Kony’s murderous campaign (which appears to have shifted from overthrowing Museveni to slaughtering as many people as possible in a bid to spread terror and gain influence throughout the region). Unless these are addressed any military initiative to defeat the LRA will be ultimately futile.

Firstly Museveni and the thugs who keep him in power actively benefit from the LRA’s existence; using it as an excuse to oppress the Acholi and more broadly to garner favour with the international community (much of which is so horrified by LRA massacres that it turns a blind eye to Museveni’s own atrocities). The financial and egotistical benefits that fighting the LRA has brought to many senior army officers similarly bolster the tyrannical president, by keeping them content and thus less likely to dissent. Although the relocation of the LRA some 600 miles to the North of the Central African Republic (combined with the positive reputation Museveni enjoys amongst the West for taking on Al-Shabab in Somalia) will neutralise this issue somewhat, any residual reluctance to categorically defeat Kony’s force will inevitably cause problems very fast.

Similarly, questions can be raised over Sudan’s commitment to the operation. It is hard to see how Omar Al-Bashir, himself indicted for Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes by the ICC, will go out of his way to put Kony in the exact same court that he has spent the last year denouncing; and with the prospect of civil war between North and South Sudan rising (mainly as a result of Al-Bashir’s attempts to hinder the Southern independence referendum due in January) it is doubtful that eliminating a decadent regional rebel group will be anywhere near the top of the agenda. Worse still, given that the LRA played a key role on the Northern side during the last civil war, it is not beyond the realms of possibility that Khartoum may once again make active overtures to Kony (indeed some reports suggest that this may already be the case).

Finally, the political turbulence in the Democratic Republic of Congo – a state consistently on the periphery of what most political scientists would deem ‘failed’ – will undoubtedly hamper its government’s ability to play any meaningful role in the joint force. True, the LRA is in part responsible for the instability and there would be clear political gain for President Joseph Kabila in eliminating it – but it is just one part of a much wider problem including various Rwandan militias, warlords and an official army so out of control that its own troops are complicit in the mass rapes and killings that they are meant to prevent. Even if the LRA is the number one target – it shares the ‘honour’ with a plethora of others.

Overall therefore, whilst the new programme is welcome its prospects are weak. A tangled web of regional politics has allowed Kony to hold Central Africa hostage for twenty years and unfortunately looks set to give him similar scope for at least the foreseeable future. The joint force may be a sign of things to come – and if combined with stability in the respective states it could prove to be immensely beneficial – but until there is relative peace in the Congo, some form of resolution to the North/South Sudanese tensions and genuine commitment from Museveni to defeat the LRA once and for all, it could mean very little. Ultimately far wider political progress is needed in the region before the massacres can be stopped, the child soldiers can be rehabilitated and Kony can be put in the one place where he truly belongs- behind bars.

Peacekeeping, failure and hope

Undeniably international peacekeeping missions receive more attention when they go wrong. Though most people have heard of the UN's failings in states such as Rwanda and Bosnia where thousands were massacred as the blue helmets floundered (sometimes because of politicians, sometimes because of those on the ground), far fewer can recall the relatively successful missions in conflict zones such as Macedonia, Cyprus and post-occupation East Timor.

However, disproportionate coverage aside, it is clear that after hundreds of interventions around the world, the disappointment and sense of failure is, at least in part, justified. The horrifying mass-rape in Eastern Congo this week took place just miles from United Nations Peacekeepers. Hundreds of women and baby boys were brutalised by militias - yet armed the armed force whose sole purpose is to protect the Democratic Republic of Congo's population did nothing to intervene. An emergency meeting has been called and officials have produced heated rhetoric about bringing the perpetrators to justice; but this will mean little to those whose lives have been torn apart by the barbaric act and does nothing to rectify the fact that the peacekeepers did not help them in their hour of need.

Unfortunately this is just the latest is a long line of failings that have befallen the UN's Congo mission. A lack of resources and troops (exacerbated by the state's enormous size), impotence in the face of what reports are now suggesting amounts to genocide, and sexual abuse by peacekeepers against the very people they are meant to be protecting, have all left the force understandably unpopular with the local population and have raised questions over whether their presence has really improved the situation. Of course there have been successes - many militias have been disarmed, the armies of neighbouring states have largely departed and significant areas are now at relative peace. However, given the potential might of the UN and the force's presence in the DRC for over a decade, it is hard to view it as anything other than a failure.

In stark contrast, proposals over the last couple of weeks for an OSCE deployment to Kyrgyzstan, have raised hopes of a far more successful kind of peacekeeping operation. In response the horrendous ethnic clashes that killed over 2000 people in June, the OSCE intends to send 52 well trained police officers to assist fledging constabularies in specific regions. Small and tokenistic as this may sound, it could have a remarkable effect.

If they have a clear mandate (something that was never established for the Congo peacekeepers) the officers will be in a better position to draft in extra resources and exercise their powers in response to the situation on the ground. By working in an advisory/training capacity they are more likely to been seen as friends rather than enemies or occupiers by the local population. And by focusing on policing rather than military peacekeeping they can potentially prevent conflict in its early stages- rather than exacerbating it or attempting to placate it once it is already out of control.

Of course, it's hard to compare such a specifically targeted operation to the Congo mission, which involved entering a state the size of Western Europe engaged in full scale civil war with multiple domestic militias and foreign armies. But if the OSCE mission is a success it will demonstrate once again that, though we're still far from getting it right, international peacekeeping missions can and do work; and that as intergovernmental organisations explore and expand ways in which they can halt conflict and human rights abuses, be it through policing, training, monitoring or some other means - we can eventually prevent failures such as those in Rwanda, Bosnia and the Democratic Republic of Congo from ever happening again.