Congo rebels want UPDF out of Bunia
By Frank Nyakairu
Congo rebels controlling the north-eastern town of Bunia have demanded that Ugandans forces leave.
The head of the rebel group Union de Patriotes Congolaise (UPC) Thomas Lubanga has written to the United Nations to order the over 1,000 soldiers at Bunia airport and other parts to withdraw.
"We have asked the UN to force the UPDF out of here because there business is over we can take care of our own business," said a close aide to Lubanga.
On Monday Lubanga said: "We have suddenly developed bad blood between us and the UPDF but we surely do not know the cause."
He declined to comment about the letter to the UN.
A MONUC member confirmed receiving the letter from UPC demanding that more pressure be exerted on the UPDF to leave Bunia.
The UPDF spokesman in Kampala Maj. Shaban Bantariza said: "We are not there (in Bunia)on our own volition we wanted to move out but we were asked by President Joseph Kabila and the UN. We actually wanted ourselves out before they did."
The relationship between the UPDF and the UPC got strained after Lubanga signed an agreement with the Rwandan-backed Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie (RCD-Goma) angering the UPDF.
Bunia is about 50 km from the Uganda boarder.
The agreement signed on January 6 in Goma, commits the two parties to "cooperate and support each other mutually in the domains of politics, military, and economy".
The agreement, which seems to have been done in secrecy, has angered the UPDF.
Bantariza said "they did not tell us about that agreement but we knew they were going to(sign) do that and we also know the meaning of the alliance." "They are free to do what they want as long as that does not translate into hostility against us," he said.
The RCD-Goma-UPC alliance comes at a time when the Ugandan and the Rwandan governments are labelling accusations on one another for plotting to over throw one anther.
January 23, 2003 00:37:14
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