"Uganda is singled out for failing to control cross-border arms trade into northeastern Ituri, where warlords prosper as a related local conflict that has killed 50,000 people since 1999 simmers. Ugandan officials had no immediate comment on the report. " Rwanda Dismisses UN Report on Congo Arms Violation
By Arthur Asiimwe NAIROBI, Kenya (Reuters) - Rwanda Tuesday dismissed a United Nations (news - web sites) report accusing it of violating an arms embargo in war-torn eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (news - web sites), which it has twice invaded in the past decade.
The report by an independent panel of experts, prepared for a U.N. Security Council committee and seen by Reuters Monday, says Uganda and Rwanda are among those violating the embargo.
"We are not surprised because that is the usual U.N. trend," Rwanda's Army spokesman Patrick Karegeya told Reuters by telephone from Kigali. "Where they have no facts, they have to falsely create their own."
The United Nations placed the embargo on parts of mineral-rich eastern Congo in 2003 to try to stamp out a five-year conflict that divided the vast nation. The war sucked in six neighboring countries and killed millions, mostly from hunger and disease.
The embargo covers Ituri district and the provinces of North and South Kivu. The panel recommended the embargo be widened to the entire country.
The experts said Rwanda maintained a "covert residual presence" within Congo, in key areas near the border.
The report said Rwanda also helped train Congolese youths from refugee camps in its territory, sending them into Congo for military purposes in violation of the embargo.
Rwanda scoffed at the charges. "It is ridiculous that they prepare reports without having our side of the story," said Karegeya.
Rwanda has invaded Congo twice in the past decade, saying it had to hunt down Hutu rebels who fled there after committing the 1994 genocide of Tutsis and moderate Hutus.
It officially withdrew its army in 2002 but tensions between the neighbors continue as Kinshasa says Rwandan troops are still in Congo. Kigali denies this but has threatened to return if neither Congo nor the U.N. forcibly disarm the Hutu rebels.
The report also said elements of Congo's regular army were continuing to supply weapons, munitions and other military equipment to Rwandan and Burundian Hutu rebels in Congo.
Uganda is singled out for failing to control cross-border arms trade into northeastern Ituri, where warlords prosper as a related local conflict that has killed 50,000 people since 1999 simmers. Ugandan officials had no immediate comment on the report.
|
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Search presents - Jib Jab's 'Second Term'
_______________________________________________ Ugandanet mailing list [email protected] http://kym.net/mailman/listinfo/ugandanet % UGANDANET is generously hosted by INFOCOM http://www.infocom.co.ug/
