World Watches as Rwanda and Uganda Violently Assault and Dismember Congo

AFRICANGLOBE – The violent plundering of Congo’s immense riches which began under King Leopold of the Belgians continues by outsiders as the world watches and even acquiesces to the criminal attacks.

The slaughter of women and children — the mass rapes of even infants are viewed merely as collateral  damage. Today the theft is committed by Rwanda and Uganda through their proxy mercenary army called M23which has reportedly committed war crimes.

The United Nations in a report released last week says M23′s chain of command leads to Rwanda’s minister of defense, Gen. James Kabehere, who of course reports to the president Gen. Paul Kagame. The report says the command chain passes through Rwanda’s military chief of staff Charles Kayonga and that it involves Gen. Jacques Nziza permanent secretary in the defense ministry and Gen. Jacques Nziza who provides strategic advice and oversees logistical support.

The nominal M23 leaders on the ground, Bosco Ntaganda, already indicted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) and Sultani Makenga, all report to the real commanders in Rwanda and in Uganda the UN report shows.

In Uganda, the UN report says, M23 reports to Uganda’s Presidential Advisor on Military Affairs Gen. Salim Saleh, who is also brother to his boss, President Yoweri K. Museveni; M23 also reports to Uganda’s national police commander Gen. Kale Kayihura.

Just days before the release of the UN report implicating the military leadership of Rwanda and Uganda, they ordered their proxy army to attack and seize the Congo city of Goma as a cynical negotiating ploy. M23 cleared their path to Goma with artillery fire; heavy weapons which presumably they were able to conceal in the bush and not acquire from Rwanda?

The UN has a 17,000-strong peace-keeping force in Congo yet this army stood by and allowed M23 to seize Goma. The UN army said its mandate is to protect Congo’s civilians and not to engage forces such as M23. How then would the UN protect civilians?

M23′s atrocities against civilians, including massacres and rapes, have been well-documented by Human Rights Watch, which has also called on the U.S. to be more forceful in publicly denouncing the atrocities and calling for sanctions against Rwanda and Uganda.

Yet Congo is so weak that today the negotiations to resolve the crisis is cynically being held in Uganda, whose ruler Gen. Museveni, is one of the masterminds of M23. So in the short run, at least, Gen. Kagame and Gen. Museveni have accomplished their goal. Both believe that even after instigating the attack on Goma by the M23 army, by acting as if they are reining an independent army, they will make it difficult for the United Nations to indict Rwanda’s and Uganda’s leadership.

When Liberia’s former president Charles Taylor backed marauding brutal militias during Sierra Leone’s civil war he was later indicted, arrested and tried by an international Special court. Taylor was convicted this April and in May was sentenced to a 50 year term. The evidence gathered against the political and military leadership of Rwanda’s and Uganda’s direct support of M23 is even much more stronger.

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Only the Congolese People Can Save Democratic Republic of the Congo

December 4, 2012 | Filed under: Africa,Featured | Posted by: Editorial_Staff

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The Congolese people continue to suffer

AFRICANGLOBE – M23, the 23 March movement, is the fourth incarnation of Paul Kagame’s proxy group for Rwanda’s territorial expansion and looting the natural resources of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

The wily Rwandan strongman has perfected this game, first posing as Congo’s liberator from the Mobutu dictatorship through the Alliance des Forces Démocratiques pour la Libération du Congo in 1996-97 under Laurent-Désiré Kabila, and then establishing the Rassemblement Congolais pour la Démocratie in 1998 to fight Kabila when he did not turn out to be the kind of puppet president Kagame wanted in Kinshasa.

Unlike these groups, however, which were established out of the blue by Rwanda and Uganda as rebel groups against the Congolese state, M23 emerged as a Tutsi unit within the Congolese army this year, as its predecessor, the Congrès National pour la Défense du Peuple (CNDP), did in 2006. Since the outbreak of the inter-African war for DRC resources following the invasion of the Congo by Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi, Kagame learned it would do no good for Rwanda to be so openly involved in invading, occupying and looting its giant neighbour.

Continued Suffering of the Congolese People

The very name M23 is a clear indication of the umbilical cord tying it to the CNDP, since the group claims its rebellion is in retaliation to the non-respect of the peace agreement between Joseph Kabila – Laurent’s son and president of Congo since 2001 – and the CNDP on 23 March 2009.

Despite its diplomatic language, that agreement represents the capitulation of the Kabila government to the strategic interests of Rwanda, incorporating into the Congolese army a militia group composed of Congolese Tutsi and Rwandan soldiers, and loyal to a foreign army.

via Only the Congolese People Can Save Democratic Republic of the Congo.

The World According To Kagame: People Who Have Power, A Lot Of Power, Should Use It Wisely (And Who He’d Like To Succeed Him)

 So what does Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame REALLY think about accusations (which he denies) that he, or at least some key figures in the Rwandan government and military, are the patrons of the Democratic Republic of Congo rebel group M23 that recently captured the eastern city of Goma?

What does he think of “international justice”? Is Rwanda going to blink over aid cuts and the threat of sanctions for its alleged support for the M23 rebels? Does Kagame and the ruling Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) see the history of the Great Lakes the way we outsiders do, or do they have a totally different take?

President Kagame, Rwanda’s Foreign minister Louise Mushikiwabo, and the country’s Defence minister Gen. James Kaberebe, to name a few, have said a lot in recent months at home and abroad (especially the UN) in defence of Rwanda.

Kagame came out swinging (New Times photo).

 

 

The World According To Kagame: People Who Have Power, A Lot Of Power, Should Use It Wisely (And Who He’d Like To Succeed Him).