NAIROBI: Civilians in eastern DR Congo face “increasing risks” as Rwandan-backed group M23 closes in on the key city of Goma, Human Rights Watch said on Saturday.
Friday saw intense clashes barely 20 kilometers (12 miles) from the provincial capital of North Kivu, which has a million inhabitants and at least as many displaced people. “Civilians in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo are at increasing risk as the abusive M23 armed group, supported by the Rwanda Defence Force (RDF), as the group nears Goma,” HRW said in a statement which warned of looming “catastrophic consequences” for people in the region. “The situation facing Goma’s civilians is becoming increasingly perilous and the humanitarian needs are enormous,” said Clementine de Montjoye, HRW’s senior Africa researcher.
“The horrific abuses by the M23, Wazalendo (pro-Kinshasa militia) and the Rwandan and Congolese armies should serve as a stark warning to concerned governments that they need to press the warring parties to protect civilians,” de Montjoye added. “Currently around 30 to 40 percent of injured people seeking medical care in Goma are civilians,” one humanitarian source told HRW.
The rights group noted that on Friday, the International Committee of the Red Cross said the hospital it runs in Goma was “saturated” after an influx of patients, largely women and children. The group also accused the M23 of “forced labor, forced recruitment, and other abusive practices.”
It added that “Rwandan forces and the M23 and the Congolese military and its allies have a legacy of atrocities including murder, rape, and looting.” The conflict between the M23, supported by some 3,000 to 4,000 Rwandan troops according to the UN, and Congolese forces has gone on for more than three years, deepening a chronic humanitarian crisis in the region. Many civilians have been forced from their homes on countless occasions. The UN estimates around 400,000 people have been displaced by fighting since the start of this year.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres expressed alarm Thursday about a resurgence of violence which he warned could spark a regional war. Guterres has convened an emergency meeting of the Security Council on Monday. DR Congo accuses Rwanda of wanting to take control of mineral-rich eastern Congo, which Kigali denies.
Angola ‘deeply concerned’
Angolan President Joao Lourenco has urged warring parties in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to return to peace talks, which collapsed last year, the foreign ministry said. “The conflict and security challenges in the east of the DRC do not have a military solution,” the ministry said in a statement late Friday, adding that Lourenco “urges the parties to return to the negotiating table immediately.”
Since Angola-led peace talks failed late last year, the M23 militia group backed by Rwandan troops has gained swathes of territory in the mineral-rich east of the DRC. That has triggered a humanitarian crisis as their forces close in on the provincial capital, which is home to a million people.
The Angolan statement said the attacks “reflect a dangerous escalation in this conflict, with enormous implications for the fragile humanitarian situation, particularly around the town of Goma, now under siege”. Lourenco “strongly condemns and repudiates these irresponsible actions by the M23 and its supporters, which jeopardize all the efforts and progress made in the Luanda Process towards a peaceful resolution of this conflict, and deplores the harmful consequences for regional security” it said. US, British and French nationals were urged to leave Goma while airports and borders were still open, in online statements or in messages sent directly by email or text.
With fighting intensifying, the United Nations mission in DRC, MONUSCO, said Friday that its peacekeepers were fighting against the M23. In August, Angola had mediated a fragile truce that stabilized the situation at the front line. But M23 went back on the attack, and December peace talks were cancelled at the last minute. — AFP