Tens of thousands flee renewed Congo bloodshed
By Mark Dummett
KINSHASA, Congo (Reuters) - Renewed fighting in northeastern Congo has forced
over 100,000 people from their homes, with a local peace deal yet to halt the
exodus from the country's latest battlefield, aid workers said Thursday.
Months of clashes between rival rebel groups have intensified around the town
of Beni, near the Ugandan border, raising fears a deal signed in South Africa
last month to end the war could go the way of previous failed peace bids.
Rebel and pro-government forces said they clashed farther south near the
border with Burundi Wednesday, killing several people and sending thousands
fleeing for the border.
Medecins Sans Frontieres and other aid organizations estimated that about
110,000 people had been displaced by the fighting around Beni, including
Pygmies forced to leave their homes deep in the Ituri Forest for the first
time.
"There was panic as the front line got nearer, and they simply voted with
their feet," MSF's Nicholas Louis told Reuters by satellite phone from Beni.
Aid workers said villages and towns emptied as soldiers from two rival rebel
factions advanced on Beni, held by a third rebel group.
The three rebel factions battling for control of the mineral-rich region
signed a local cease-fire Monday, but aid workers in Beni said people were
still on the move Thursday.
"The situation is very fluid, so every time we think the situation is calm
and stable, things change overnight," Michelle Brown of the medical charity
MERLIN said.
Unarmed U.N. observers monitoring the cease-fire reported no new incidents of
fighting Thursday, but a spokesman in Kinshasa said "they remained concerned
by the situation."
SEVERAL KILLED IN NEW FIGHTING
Farther south, thousands of people fled after rebels clashed with
pro-government forces near the lakeside port of Uvira, which has changed
hands several times in recent months.
Bernard Ntwari, a spokesman for the U.N. refugee agency, said over 2,000
refugees fleeing the violence in South Kivu province arrived at the Burundi
border Wednesday.
Manace Bita, a spokesman for the Mai Mai militia loosely allied to Congo's
government, said 20 civilians and eight fighters of the powerful
Rwandan-backed rebels Rally for Congolese Democracy or RCD died as well as
two Mai Mai fighters -- traditional warriors who use bows and arrows as well
as guns.
"Our objective is to capture Uvira town and the whole east region of DRC
(Congo)," Bita said.
The RCD, which recaptured Uvira in December after three days of fighting,
denied any of its troops were lost in Wednesday's battle and said many Mai
Mai fighters had been killed.
Congo's warring parties signed a deal in December to share power and reunify
the large central African country, formerly known as Zaire, that has been
divided since war broke out in August 1998, drawing in six foreign armies.
Many foreign soldiers have pulled out, but local militia violence has surged
in the vacuum they left behind, prolonging a war that has killed an estimated
2 million people.
(Additional reporting by Patrick Nduwimana in Bujumbura)
01/02/03 15:57 ET
