Visit our website: HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --------------------------------------------- "Hutu leaders who do not flee the country are uncertain about their future. More than 150,000 Hutu mostly elite, business people, clergy, and social leaders have been kept in jail for more than five years without trial. These Rwandan prisons have arguably become the most crowded, most dangerous, and most inhumane prisons in the World. Hundreds of thousands of people are held in truck containers, disused factories, old bathrooms, wet or leaking dungeons, or anywhere things can be confined. Crowded cells serve as toilets, sleeping, and living rooms. Prisoners are regularly tortured. Thousands have lost limbs, developed skin diseases, or caught recurrent or terminal illnesses. " Rwanda: The Armee de Liberation du Rwanda (ALIR) steps up its attacks ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- AfroAmerica Network Correspondent Ruhengeri, Rwanda 12.05.99 After months of relative quietness, the Armee de Liberation du Rwanda (ALIR) is staging brazen attacks on military targets in Northwestern Rwanda. Due to strict military control over the region, the AfroAmerica Network Correspondent was unable to freely travel into the region for two months. The correspondent reports daily clashes between the government army, Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA) and the ALIR rebel army. On September 15, 1999, ALIR mounted their biggest raid, occupying the Mukamira military camp, one the most reinforced army barracks in Rwanda, for hours. Several RPA soldiers were killed by about 100 ALIR rebels armed with automatic weapons, machetes and spears, according to an RPA army soldier, who escaped the slaughter. The military barracks were ransacked and several houses were burned to the ground by ALIR soldiers before they withdrew. On September 20, 1999, a similar raid on the Nkuli communal offices, where the RPA had moved its quarters from Mukamira, freed several prisoners, and killed 15 government soldiers. A significant military equipment, including weapons, ammunitions, and hand-held rocket launchers were seized. Local military commanders and political leaders admit that the latest raids are consistently well coordinated, swift, and successful. These raids constitute a blow to the government's attempts to quell the insurgency, especially as it came back in the heart of the country, while the front line of the Rwandan invasion of the Democratic Republic of the Congo is thousands of miles away, suggesting that ALIR rebels feel confident enough to move around at will. To respond to this latest upsurge in insurgency activities by ALIR, the government has launched reconciliation rallies, led by an ethnic Hutu minister, John Nepomuscene Nayinzira. However, these rallies seem doomed to failure. John Nepomuscene Nayinzira is viewed as a coopted puppet minister. Meanwhile, Rwandans including Hutu and influential Tutsis are fleeing the country in large numbers for Europe, America and other countries in Africa. Hutu leaders who do not flee the country are uncertain about their future. More than 150,000 Hutu mostly elite, business people, clergy, and social leaders have been kept in jail for more than five years without trial. These Rwandan prisons have arguably become the most crowded, most dangerous, and most inhumane prisons in the World. Hundreds of thousands of people are held in truck containers, disused factories, old bathrooms, wet or leaking dungeons, or anywhere things can be confined. Crowded cells serve as toilets, sleeping, and living rooms. Prisoners are regularly tortured. Thousands have lost limbs, developed skin diseases, or caught recurrent or terminal illnesses. ------------------------------------------------- This Discussion List is the follow-up for the old stopnato @listbot.com that has been shut down ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9spWA Or send an email To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] This email was sent to: [email protected] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
