Rwanda-Congo border tense after gun battle
Independent - 44 minutes ago
SUNDAY, 22 JUNE 2014 21:49 BY AGENCIES
  
Officers from the UN, Rwandan, and Congolese Joint Verification
Mission (JVM) tour a part of the Rwandan border on June 12 in
Kanyesheza, where fighting is said to have taken place. Rwandan and
Congolese troops traded heavy weapons fire on June 12 in a second day
of fighting on the border between the two neighbours. AFP PHOTO
MONUSCO opens investigation into incident
After clashes between Congolese and Rwandan troops, the United Nations
mission in DR-Congo, MONUSCO, has pledged "to take immediate measures
to restore security in the border areas" and "open an investigation
into the circumstances of the incident".
The mission chief, Martin Kobler, according to Misna, also urged the
DR-Congo and Rwandan governments to "resolve issues on the demarcation
of their common borders peacefully".
The fighting took place June 12 and June 13. Based on a reconstruction
by Kinshasa including mutual accusations between Kinshasa and Kigali
troops, during an incursion, Rwandan troops abducted and killed a
Congolese officer, Misna said.
Rwanda says Congolese troops crossed into its territory and opened
fire on Rwandan soldiers.
"We are only seeking to reinforce our positions,"North Kivu governor
Julien Paluku said. A resident of a village on the road from Goma to
Kanyesheza, said he saw mounted heavy machine-guns and three army
tanks roll past on Thursday morning.
Each side denied returning fire when shelled by the other.
After the last exchanges of fire in the Kanyesheja area on June 13, in
the North Kivu province, "the situation is calm" along the border,
according to an announcement by Lt. Col. Olivier Hamuli, spokesman of
the FARDC (Congolese armed forces).
The truce in the armed conflict has not convinced the population to
return home, in particular to Kanyesheja, where schools were closed
for days and all civilian activities are almost at a halt. By June 14,
local sources report an atmosphere of "high tension".
Some 72 hours from the start of the hostilities along the unstable
border no toll had yet been released of casualties.
Rwanda's army on June 12 displayed five bodies to journalists which it
said were Congolese soldiers killed in the fighting on Wednesday, an
AFP reporter said.
Lambert Mende, a spokesman for the Congolese government, accused
Rwanda of lying about the deaths of its soldiers.
"Rwandans have taken corpses from hospitals, or killed poor peasants
-- perhaps Congolese, Rwandan maybe -- just to back up their story,"he
said.
The DRC has said only one of its soldiers was killed.
The head of MONUSCO, Martin Kibler, urged the sides to remain "calm"
and "abstain from all violence" to restore security in the border
zone, toward "a peaceful solution to the border demarcation dispute".
A MONUSCO statement referred to "loss of lives", but did not provide
any numbers.
After the clashes abated, rival troops were engaged in a staredown
from afar in the mountainous Kanyesheza region which straddles the
border, a Congolese administrative official said on condition of
anonymity.
An AFP reporter on a press trip to the area with the Rwandan army and
foreign defence attaches said the combat zone -- some 20 kilometres
(12 miles) north of the border towns of Goma in the DRC and Gisenyi in
Rwanda -- was calm on June 12 afternoon.
"There were heavy arms fire, explosions, rockets,"which lasted for
half an hour, said a resident in the area of the morning clashes.
Another resident on the Congolese side of the frontier said about "30
families"were fleeing the border regions after the fighting.
Trading blame
A senior Congolese military officer said that Rwandan troops had
attacked their positions, but a Rwandan military source, also speaking
anonymously, told AFP that there had "not been serious clashes, they
were sporadic firings" of heavy weapons.
The latest cross-border clash came a day after the two sides exchanged
automatic weapons fire, with each blaming the other for the outbreak
of violence.
In an apparent sign of goodwill, the Rwandan and Congolese armies sent
a team from a Joint Verification Mission (JVM) they have formed with
the United Nations to carry out checks in the conflict zone, a JVM
official who monitors the border said.
Both the JVM and a western military source confirmed the deaths of the
five Congolese soldiers. No deaths were reported in the June 12
fighting.
Farhan Haq, a spokesman for the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, said
diplomatic efforts were under way to "avoid unnecessary tension" and
to encourage the DRC and Rwanda to "continue furthering good
neighbourly relations."
Strained relations
Relations have been strained for decades between the neighbours, with
the DRC accusing Rwanda of seeking to destabilise it by backing
various militia which have risen up against Kinshasa.
Much of the tension arises from the presence in the eastern DRC of
Rwandan Hutu rebels in the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of
Rwanda (FDLR).
This armed movement's older members are accused of taking part in the
1994 genocide of ethnic Tutsis in Rwanda which left an estimated
800,000 dead in three months of slaughter.
The FDLR has since been accused of serious atrocities against
villagers in the DRC.
The Hutu fighters first fled across the border 20 years ago when the
Tutsi-led Rwandan Patriotic Front took power in Kigali, led by Paul
Kagame, who is today president of the small central African nation.
Congolese authorities are seeking to disarm FDLR forces, estimated at
around 1,500, according to the United Nations, or 4,000, according to
Kigali.
About 100 rebels turned themselves in on May 31 and have been given
the option of returning to Rwanda or seeking political asylum in the
DRC.
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