>Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 16:27:16 +0000 >To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] >From: James Heartfield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> <snip> > >The assassination of Congo president Laurent Kabila was greeted with >ill-disguised glee amongst Western commentators. It was not always thus. >US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright described Kabila as a 'beacon >of hope' and a 'strong new leader' when he took power from the ageing >dictator Mobutu in 1997. Then Kabila was supported by the State >Department's favorite regional dictators Paul Kagame of Rwanda, and >Yoweri Museveni of Uganda - the three lionised as a new generation of >African leaders. But since then Kabila, Museveni and Kagame fell out, >and the Rwandan army that had taken him to power, took arms against him, >plunging the country into war. > >Most surreal of all the comments on Kabila is the bandying about of >Ernesto 'Che' Guevara's assessment of Kabila's role in the Congo wars of >the 1960s. Very few present-day politicians would have met the Cuban >guerilla leader's exacting standards, but Guevara's critical comments on >Kabila are regularly quoted by newspapers that have no sympathy with >Guevara's goal of ridding the Congo of imperialism. Indeed, Richard >Gott, who republished Guevara's Congo diaries as a blast against Kabila >at the same time charges him with having 'alienated foreign investors by >refusing to make payments on the gigantic foreign debt of $14bn incurred >by his profligate predecessor' (Guardian January 19, 2001). > >The truth is that the future of the Congo continues to be decided by >forces outside its borders. On independence, the United Nations' own >envoy Conor Cruise O'Brien charged the UN with complicity in the murder >of radical prime minister Patrice Lumumba. The United States backed >dictator Mobutu's regime as a base for attacks on the radical >nationalist movement in Angola. Kabila's own rise to power was not >popular, but simply better supported. His subsequent fall was decided >not in the Congo, but Washington. > >-- >James Heartfield _______________________________________________ Crashlist website: http://website.lineone.net/~resource_base
