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5

International Role: UN in the Rwanda-Congo Crisis from 1990-2000

As explained in the last chapter, the Rwandan Civil War began in October 1990 when the

Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) rebel group invaded across Uganda's southern border into

northern Rwanda. The RPF was composed of over 4000 soldiers, most the sons of Tutsi refugees

who had fled ethnic purges in Rwanda from 1959 to 1963. It portrayed itself as a democratic,

multi-ethnic movement and demanded an end to ethnic discrimination, to economic looting of the

country by government elites and a stop to the security situation that continued to generate

refugees. It was supported by the Ugandan government of Yoweri Museveni, who had come to

power in the Ugandan Bush War with significant support from the Rwandan refugees in the

country. However, the Rwandan Armed Forces (FAR) was saved by reinforcements from France

and Zaire, who backed the government of Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana, who had

been in power since 1973.1

The role of France in the Rwandan Genocide of 1994 has been a source of controversy

and debate; both within and beyond France and Rwanda. France actively supported the Hutu-led

government of Juvénal Habyarimana against the Tutsi-dominated Rwandan Patriotic Front, which

since 1990 had been engaged in a conflict intended to restore the rights of Rwandan Tutsis both

within Rwanda and exiled in neighboring countries following over four decades of anti-Tutsi

violence. France provided arms and military training to Habyarimana's youth militias, the

Interahamwe and Impuzamugambi, which were among the government's primary means to

operationalise the genocide following the assassination of Juvénal Habyarimana and Cyprien

Ntaryamira on 6th April, 1994.2

The French intervention of two parachute companies, explained as an attempt to protect

its own nationals, actually blocked the RPF advance on the capital Kigali. In contrast, the

government of Belgium, the former colonial power, cut all support to the Habyarimana regime,

which viewed the action as abandonment. Thwarted by the French, the RPF suffered a humiliating

retreat back into the Virunga Mountains along the border. After the demoralizing death of Major-

General Fred Rwigyema, the collapse of the RPF was prevented through the leadership of Paul

Kagame.

The RPF thus managed to retain control of a sliver of land in the north, from which it

continued to launch raids.3 However, the RPF invasion, which displaced approximately 600,000

1 Melvern, Linda. France and Genocide. The Times, August 8, 2008. http://www.lindamelvern.com/index.php/news/18-news/120-france-and-genocide-the-murky-truth 2 Ibid. 3 Melvern, Linda. Conspiracy to Murder: The Rwandan Genocide. Verso, New York, 2004. pp 13-16.

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people into crowded internally displaced person camps, also radicalized the Hutu populace. The

Tutsi civilians in Rwanda, roughly 14% of the population, were labeled ‘ibyitso’ ("accomplices")

or ‘inyenzni’ ("cockroaches"), who were accused of secretly aiding the RPF invaders.4 Anti-Tutsi

propaganda was spread through the publication Kangura, a forerunner to the Radio Télévision

Libre des Mille Collines, which was created immediately after the invasion.5 6 The first plans for

mass murder of Tutsi were also developed toward the end of 1990, mostly in a series of secret

meetings in Gisenyi prefecture of the Akazu7, a network of associates based around Agathe

Habyarimana, the First Lady.

UNOMUR and UNAMIR

A number of ceasefire agreements were signed by the RPF and government, including

one signed on 22 July 1992 in Arusha, Tanzania that resulted in the Organisation of African Unity

(OAU) establishing a 50-member Neutral Military Observer Group (NMOG I) led by Nigerian

General Ekundayo Opaleye.8 The negotiations for a peace settlement continued in Arusha,

interrupted by a massive RPF offensive in early February 1993. Rwanda continued to allege

Ugandan support for the RPF, which both the RPF and Uganda duly denied, but resulting in both

countries sending letters to President of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) requesting

that military observers be deployed along the border to verify that military supplies were not

crossing.

This resulted in the United Nations Observer Mission Uganda-Rwanda (UNOMUR)

being approved by the UNSC on 22nd June 1993 to deploy along the Ugandan side of the border.9

Seven days later, UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali announced that Brigadier-General

Roméo Dallaire was to be appointed the Chief Military Observer for UNOMUR, which reached

its authorised strength of 81 observers by September. NMOG I was deployed inside Rwanda.10

4 Dallaire, Roméo. Shake Hands with the Devil. Carroll & Graf, New York, 2003. pp 67. 5 Paul R. Bartrop, Steven Leonard Jacobs. Modern Genocide: The Definitive Resource and Document Collection. ABC-CLIO, 2014. pp 1776. "The creation of Kangura, for which Ngeze was made the chief editor, was part of a much wider strategy on the part of the State. Its first issue appeared in May 1990, and its last in February 1994 - two months before the start of the Genocide - and it became a primary instrument in the preparation of the Hutu population for the actions against the Tutsi population that took place after April 6, 1994." 6 Maherzi, Lotfi. World Communication Report; The Media and the challenge of the new technologies. UNESCO Publishing, 1997. pp 233. 7 Melvern, Linda. Conspiracy to Murder: The Rwandan Genocide. Verso, 2006. pp 20. "By all account plans were being laid in Rwanda for mass murder on a countrywide scale towards the end of 1990 just after the RPF invaded. The idea that genocide of the Tutsi would solve all problems was spread in a series of secret meetings starting at the end of October, most of them taking place in Gisyeni prefecture." 8 Lahneman, William J. Military intervention: cases in context for the twenty-first century. Rowman & Littlefield, 2004. pp 71. 9 Security Council Resolutions 1993 - www.un.org/Docs/scres/1993/scres93.htm - UN Resolutuion 846 .Pdf http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N93/366/31/IMG/N9336631.pdf?OpenElement 10 UN.Org - UNAMIR Background http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/missions/past/unamirS.htm

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In the meantime, talks in Arusha had reconvened on 16 March 1993, resulting in the

signing of the Arusha Accords, a comprehensive agreement to create a power-sharing

government, on the fourth of August. Both the RPF and Rwandan government requested UN

assistance in implementing the agreement. In early August 1993, NMOG I was enlarged and

replaced by NMOG II, consisting of about 130 members, in preparation for an expected UN-led

peacekeeping force.11

In October 1993, the Security Council, by its resolution 872 (1993), established another

international force, the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR), to help the

parties implement the agreement, monitor its implementation and support the transitional

Government.12 UNAMIR's demilitarised zone sector headquarters was established upon the

arrival of the advance party and became operational on 1st November 1993, when the NMOG II

elements were absorbed into UNAMIR. Deployment of the UNAMIR battalion in Kigali,

composed of contingents from Belgium and Bangladesh, was completed in the first part of

December 1993, and the Kigali weapons-secure area was established on 24th December. The

United Nations solicited troop contributions, but initially only Belgium with a half a battalion of

400 troops, and Bangladesh with a logistical element of 400 troops, offered personnel.13

The UNAMIR mandate was:

"(a) To contribute to the security of the city of Kigali inter alia with in a weapons-secure area established by the parties in and around the city; (b) To monitor observance of the cease-fire agreement, which calls for the establishment of cantonment and assembly zones and the demarcation of the new demilitarised zone and other demilitarization procedures; (c) To monitor the security situation during the final period of the transitional government’s mandate, leading up to the elections;(d) To assist with mine clearance, primarily through training programmes;(e) To investigate at the request of the parties or on its own initiative instances of alleged non-compliance with the provisions of the Arusha Peace Agreement relating to the integration of the armed forces, and pursue any such instances with the parties responsible and report thereon as appropriate to the Secretary-General; (f) To monitor the process of repatriation of Rwandese refugees and resettlement of displaced persons to verify that it is carried out in a safe and orderly manner; (g) To assist in the coordination of humanitarian assistance activities in conjunction with relief operations; (h) To investigate and report on incidents regarding the activities of the gendarmerie and police.”14 Its authorised strength was 2,548 personnel, but it took some five months of piecemeal

commitments for the mission to reach this level.15 On 21st April, 1994, the UNSC passed

11 Ibid. 12 Ibid. 13 Ibid. 14 UN Security Council. Resolution 872 (5 October 1993). Adopted by the Security Council at its 3288th meeting .Pdf. Security Council. pp 1, paragraph 3. http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N93/540/63/PDF/N9354063.pdf?OpenElement. See also UN.org. Rwanda - UNAMIR Mandate. http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/missions/past/unamirM.htm 15 UN.org. Rwanda - UNAMIR Background. http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/missions/past/unamirS.htm

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Resolution 912 and voted to extend the mandate of UNAMIR to 29th July 1994, after expressing

"deep concern at the delay in the establishment of the broad-based transitional Government and

the Transitional National Assembly" and "concern at the deterioration in security in the country,

particularly in Kigali."16 Ironically, after some countries, especially Belgium whose troops formed

half of UNAMIR’s total troops, unilaterally withdrew their contingents, the Security Council, by

its Resolution 912 of 21st April 1994, reduced UNAMIR's strength from 2,548 to 270 as

recommended by the Secretary General's report of 20th April, 1994 to the UNSC on the assistance

mission to Rwanda.17

The reason that Belgium quickly withdrew its peacekeepers under the command of

UNAMIR was that 10 Belgian members of 2nd Commando Battalion, of the Belgian

Paracommando Regiment were murdered in cold blood18 along with Minister Agathe

Uwilingiyimana on April 6th, 1994; the same fateful day that Habyarimana’s plane was shot down

and the genocide began in Rwanda. These troops were murdered after handing over their weapons

to Rwandan government troops. They were advised to do so by their battalion commander who

was unclear on the legal issues with authorising them to defend themselves, even though they had

already been under fire for approximately two hours.19

This confusion over legal protocols typified the response of UNAMIR to the escalating

chaos. The mission's vague mandate, created under Chapter VI of the UN Charter was unclear

about the right to use force, particularly in defence of civilians.20 The mission's original intention

16 UN.Org. UNSC Resolutions 1994. Security Council Resolution 912 (21 April 1994) .Pdf. pp 2. http://daccess-ods.un.org/TMP/6177877.78377533.html 17 UN.Org. Reports of the Secretary General to the Security Council. Report 470 (20 April 1994) Special Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda. pp 4, Para 16. "The team would require the support of an infantry company to provide security, as well as a number of military observers to monitor the situation, apart from civilian staff, the total being estimated at about 270. The remainder of UNAMIR personnel would be withdrawn, but UNAMIR, as a mission, would continue to exist." http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N94/186/70/PDF/N9418670.pdf?OpenElement 18 Schmidt, William E. Troops Rampage in Rwanda; Dead Said to Include Premier. New York Times, April 8, 1994. 19 Nsia-Pepra, Kofi. UN Robust Peacekeeping: Civilian Protection in Violent Civil Wars. Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. pp 116. "The circumstances leading to the murder of the ten Belgian troops typifies the confusion over legal protocols on the use of force in UNAMIR. The Belgian troops of second Commando Battalion, the Paracommando Regiment, were killed after they were advised by their battalion commander to hand over their weapons to Rwandan government troops because the Commander was unclear on the legal issues in respect of the use of force for self-defence despite being under fire for approximately two hours. Security Council resolutions for UNAMIR mission were vague and unclear on the right to use force in stopping the genocide." 20 Schaefer, Brett D. ConUNdrum: The Limits of the United Nations and the Search for Alternatives. Rowman & Littlefield, 2009. pp 60. "It was the fault of a more fundamental failure of the entire U.N. system. The mission's vague mandate was unclear about the use of force, particularly in defense of civilians. As the genocide unfolded, the major U.N. powers dithered. They prevented any strengthening of UNAMIR's mandate and delayed contributing personnel until the killings had largely ended."

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was to oversee the implementation of the Arusha peace agreement. However, by the time of the

genocide, the peace agreement was completely irrelevant and UNAMIR was legally powerless.21

Frightened by the deaths of their soldiers and aware of the international embarrassment

the United States suffered in Mogadishu, Somalia after the civil war there claimed the lives of

several US troops in the Battle of Mogadishu, the Belgian government quickly called for the

withdrawal of the Belgian contingent of UNAMIR. The critical ground situation and almost

panicky withdrawal of Belgian troops was vividly described by a fax from Jacques-Roger Booh-

Booh, a Cameroonian peacekeeper in charge of UNAMIR forces to Kofi Annan in New York.22

After the withdrawal of other nations' contingents, UNAMIR was left with 270 soldiers supported

by less than 200 local authorities. Lieutenant-General Dallaire, despite orders to withdraw from

Kigali, refused to abandon the country to the genocide, and remained to lead what forces

remained.23

On 17th May 1994, Security Council increased the number of authorised troops to 5,500

and expanded UNAMIR’s mandate to include following additional responsibilities: "(a) To

contribute to the security and protection of displaced persons, refugees and civilians at risk in

Rwanda, including through the establishment and maintenance, where feasible, of secure

humanitarian areas; (b) To provide security and support for the distribution of relief supplies and

humanitarian relief operations".24

Ignoring signs of an impending Genocide and Inaction

During the months prior to the Rwandan genocide, General Roméo Dallaire, commander

of the U.N. Assistance Mission in Rwanda (UNAMIR), warned the U.N. Department of

Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) that Hutu extremists were planning a campaign to exterminate

Tutsis. In a now famous cable to New York on January 11th, 1994, which DPKO authorised him

to share with the U.S., French and Belgian Embassies, General Dallaire asked for authority to

search for and seize the caches of machetes and other weapons that had been shipped into Rwanda

for the Hutu militias, the Interahamwe.25 Iqbal Riza, deputy to then Undersecretary General for

Peacekeeping Kofi Annan, in a letter signed by Annan, denied him permission to act, as

exceeding UNAMIR’s mandate, and instructed him instead to take the information to the

Rwandan government, many of whose members were planning the genocide. DPKO’s refusal to

21 UN Security Council. Resolution 872 (5 October 1993). Adopted by the Security Council at its 3288th meeting .Pdf. Security Council. http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N93/540/63/PDF/N9354063.pdf?OpenElement 22 Daily Fax, UNAMIR to UN Headquarters, 14 April, 1994 (Appendix 4). 23 Bernd Horn, Stephen John Harris. Warrior Chiefs: Perspectives on Senior Canadian Military Leaders. Dundurn, 2001. pp 345. 24 UN.Org. UNSC Resolutions 1994. Security Council Resolution 918 (1994) .Pdf. pp 3, paragraph 3. http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N94/218/36/PDF/N9421836.pdf?OpenElement 25 Dallaire, Roméo, Cable to General Baril, UNDPKO, 11 January 1994, in Adelman, Howard and Suhrke, Astri (eds.), The Path of A Genocide. The Rwanda Crisis from Uganda to Zaire, London: Transaction Publishers, 2000. pp xxi.

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authorise action was confirmed on 14th January, 1994 by Secretary General Boutros-Ghali

himself.26

General Dallaire’s early warning of genocide was corroborated by the assassinations and

further trial massacres of January to March 1994, which were also reported in cables to the U.S.

State and Defense Departments.27 On January 21-22, UNAMIR seized a planeload of Belgian

arms (shipped on a French plane) purchased by the Rwandan Armed Forces, which were then

kept in joint UNAMIR/ Rwandan government custody.28 At the request of DPKO, Dallaire

provided confirmation of arms shipments and was finally authorised by the DPKO on 3rd

February, 1994 to "assist the government of Rwanda" in recovering illegal arms.29 In mid-

February, the Rwandan Minister of Defense requested landing authorization for three planes

carrying arms, but General Dallaire refused. On February 27, General Dallaire repeated his

request to DPKO for authorization to seize the caches of weapons the Interahamwe militias had

hidden all over Rwanda.30 (General Dallaire had sent a Senegalese UNAMIR soldier to see some

of the arms caches with his own eyes.)31 But U.N. authorities, including his direct superior,

Canadian General Maurice Baril, again refused, referring privately to General Dallaire as a

‘cowboy’.32 Belgium explicitly warned the U.N. Secretary General of impending genocide on

February 25, 1994, but Belgium’s plea for a stronger U.N. peacekeeping force was rebuffed by

members of the U.N. Security Council, particularly the U.S. and the United Kingdom.33

The U.N. did not wait to intervene in Rwanda until the beginning of the genocide. Acting

under Chapter VI of the U.N. Charter, the U.N. Department of Peacekeeping Operations had

deployed 2,539 U.N. Assistance Mission in Rwanda (UNAMIR) troops to Rwanda by April 6,

1994.34 It is claimed by Dr Alan Kuperman in his book ‘The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention’

that U.N. Peacekeepers were too lightly armed to deter the Rwandan genocidaires who he says

numbered 100,000, including the heavily armed Presidential Guard.35 He agrees with General

Dallaire that UNAMIR needed heavier weapons, full deployment of its 2548 authorised troops

plus an equal number of reinforcements, all of them well-trained and well- supplied, with a clear

26 Des Forges, Alison, Leave None To Tell The Story, Genocide in Rwanda, Human Rights Watch & FIDH, New York, 1999. pp 154. 27 Ibid. pp. 159-171. 28 Ibid. pp 156-157 29 Stanton, Gregory H. The Rwandan Genocide: Why Early Warning Failed. Journal of African Conflicts and Peace Studies, University of South Florida, Vol. 1, Issue 2, 2009, pp 6-25. pp 8. 30 Ibid. 31 Ibid. 32 Louise Mushikiwabo, Jack Kramer. Rwanda Means the Universe: A Native's Memoir of Blood and Bloodlines. Macmillan, 2007. pp 38. 33 Kuperman, Alan J. The Limits of Humanitarian lntervention. Genocide in Rwanda. The Brookings Institution Press, Washington, D.C., 2001. pp 85. 34 Melvern, Linda, A People Betrayed. The Role of the West in Rwanda’s Genocide, Zed Books, London, 2000. pp 106. 35 Kuperman, Alan J. The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention: Genocide in Rwanda. Brookings Institution Press, 2004.

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mandate giving them authority to forcefully stop killing. That could have been written into U.N.

Security Council resolution 872 that created UNAMIR. But the U.S. and U.K. had opposed a

robust mandate with the 4,500 troops recommended by General Dallaire because it would have

been too ‘expensive’.36

Declassified US intelligence reports clearly indicate that the US was fully aware of the

Tutsi backed RPF’s advance into Rwandese territory and the ground situation.37 In fact the

attitude of the major world powers towards the Rwandan crisis can be summed up in the

following excerpt from Allan Thomas’ book, ‘The Media and the Rwanda Genocide’:

"A representative of one major power came to me within the first weeks of the genocide and said quite clearly that, after doing an assessment, they had decided that they were not going to come and stop the carnage. There were bodies all over. We were already burning bodies with diesel fuel, because of the fear of disease, the smell and the wild dogs. This representative said, 'You know, this country is of no strategic value. Geographically, it provides us nothing. Its not even worth putting a radar station here. Economically it’s nothing, because there's no strategic resources, only tea and coffee, and the bottom is falling out of those markets.'

This person said, 'In fact what there's too much of here is people. Well, we're not going to come because of people.' In quantifying that, he went on to say that his government could only reconsider its decision not to intervene if for every one of its soldiers either killed or injured, there would be an equivalent of 85,000 dead Rwandans."38

When the genocide began, policy makers in Washington and at the U.N. believed that

UNAMIR forces lacked the strength to arrest the spread of the conflagration, and they refused to

consider sending in their own troops. In U.S. government parlance, that was a “non-starter.”

When that word was used, it really meant, “We don’t want to think about it.”39 It is the product of

what social scientists have called “groupthink.”40 Those who dissent are afraid to step forward to

challenge the group assumptions. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs George

Moose,41 National Security Council Peacekeeping Advisor Susan Rice, and International

36 Melvern, Linda, A People Betrayed. The Role of the West in Rwanda’s Genocide, Zed Books, London, 2000. pp 85. 37 Declassified US Defence Intelligence Report. Rwanda: The Rwandan Patriotic Front's Offensive (U) - Key Judegements. 9 May, 1994 (Appendix 6). 38 Thompson, Allan. The Media and the Rwanda Genocide. IDRC, 2007. pp 13. 39 Stanton, Gregory H. The Rwandan Genocide: Why Early Warning Failed. Journal of African Conflicts and Peace Studies, University of South Florida, Vol. 1, Iss. 2, 2009, pp 6-25. pp 15. 40 Ibid 41 Cohen, Jared. One-hundred Days of Silence: America and the Rwanda Genocide. Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. pp 86. "Despite earlier U.S. efforts to push for a full withdrawal of UNAMIR, a memorandum from Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs George Moose and Acting Assistant Secretary of State for International Organisations George Ward informed Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbot of the reviewed position on UNAMIR: UNAMIR cannot fulfill its mandate under the current circumstances and is unlikely to attract personnel or obtain equipment for an expanded operation. UNAMIR is currently affording some degree of protection to 12,000 refugees in Kigali. We should not advocate (and we could not get agreement in the Security Council for) abandoning these people, nor does it seem feasible for UNAMIR forces to take the refugees with them. UNAMIR is, thus, as a practical matter, stuck in Kigali until the situation there calms sufficiently for these people to disperse. Once this happens, however, we should urge an orderly withdrawal of all UNAMIR forces."

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Organisations Deputy Assistant Secretary George Ward42 had all agreed that UNAMIR could not

fulfill its mandate and should be withdrawn.43 They did not consider changing UNAMIR’s

mandate because they assumed that troop-contributors had only committed to a peacekeeping

operation, not an operation to stop genocide. No one suggested asking the troop-contributors if

they would stay. No one suggested sending in U.S. troops. The U.N. Security Council’s earlier

failure, because of U.S. and U.K. reluctance, to send a strong UNAMIR force created the self-

fulfilling prophecy that nothing effective could be done.

Thus, in the U.N. Security Council, the U.S. took an active stance against keeping the

UNAMIR troops in Rwanda. Declassified US Department of State documents from Arlene

Render to Pru Bushnell clearly indicate the US stance.44 Ambassador Karl Inderfurth announced

that position on 15th April, 1994 in "Informals" which were closed meetings of the Security

Council, with the representative of the genocidal Rwandan regime present.45 Ambassador

Inderfurth’s announcement of U.S. policy had fatal consequences. The next day, the Rwandan

Interim Government met, and knowing it could now act with impunity, decided to extend the

genocide to Southern Rwanda.46

In the first week of the genocide, General Dallaire asked for a change in UNAMIR's

mandate that would authorize him to take action to stop as much killing as possible. But instead as

mentioned earlier in this chapter, on April 21st the Security Council, led by the U.S. and the U.K.,

ordered reduction of UNAMIR to a token force of 270 troops.47 Over five hundred thousand

Rwandan Tutsis were murdered48 while the U.N. “did a Pontius Pilate,” in General Dallaire’s

words when he told U.S. State Department officials in late 1994 about UNAMIR’s role.49

42 Samuel Totten, Steven Leonard Jacobs. Pioneers of Genocide Studies. Transaction Publishers, 2013. pp 412. "Worse yet, and little known, was the decision of the Interagency Peacekeeping CORE Group, led by the National Security Council's Susan Rice and the State Department International Organisation Affairs Bureau's Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary George Ward, to recommend withdrawal of the 2,500 UNAMIR peacekeepers in Rwanda." See also U.S. Department of State Briefing Memorandum from Assistant Secretary of State for International Organisations Douglas J. Bennet through Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Peter Tarnoff to Secretary of State Warren Christopher, "Phone Call to UN Secretary General Boutros-Ghali on Bosnia and Rwanda," April 13, 1994, Confidential in William Ferroggiaro, A National Security Archive Briefing Book, August 20, 2001. 43 US Department of State, cable number 099440, to US Mission to the United Nations, New York, “Talking Points for UNAMIR Withdrawal”, April 15, 1994 (Appendix 8). http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB53/rw041594.pdf. See also US Department of State, cable number 127262, to US Mission to the United Nations, New York, “Rwanda: Security Council Discussions”, May 13, 1994 (Appendix 9). 44 US Department of State, document number 20520, from Arlene Render to Pru Bushnell, Washington D.C, April 21, 1994 (Appendix 7). 45 Stanton, Gregory H. The Rwandan Genocide: Why Early Warning Failed. Journal of African Conflicts and Peace Studies, University of South Florida, Vol. 1, Iss. 2, 2009, pp 6-25. pp 9. 46 Melvern, Linda, A People Betrayed. The Role of the West in Rwanda’s Genocide, Zed Books, London, 2000, pp 163, note 5. 47 UN.Org. UNSC Resolutions 1994. Security Council Resolution 912 (1994) .Pdf. pp 2. http://daccess-ods.un.org/TMP/6177877.78377533.html 48 Dr. Alan Kuperman, the author of 'The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention: Genocide in Rwanda' disputes the commonly accepted death toll of 800,000, claiming that Rwanda’s pregenocide Tutsi

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It is argued that three-quarters of the Tutsi victims would have died even if the West had

launched a maximum intervention immediately upon learning that a nationwide genocide was

being attempted in Rwanda.50 It is concluded that although intervention during the Rwandan

genocide would have been less effective than some think, saving 125,000 lives would have

justified maximal intervention; noting that even the belated, minimal response proposed in May

1994 by the U.S., which would have unrealistically expected Tutsis to walk through militia

infested areas to reach “safe zones” outside Rwanda might have saved 75,000 lives.51 The cruel

fate awaiting people who relied on weakly defended U.N. “safe areas” was demonstrated only too

painfully a year later in Srebrenica, Bosnia when 8,000 Muslim men and boys under the

protection of 370 U.N Dutch peacekeepers in a UN “safe zone” were killed after the ‘Dutchbat’

(Dutch Battalion) soldiers were surrounded and forced to surrender by units of Bosnian Serb

Army of Republika Srpska (VRS) under the command of General Ratko Mladić.52

General Romeo Dallaire, the UN Force Commander and the man on the ground who

knew the situation best, was convinced that a robust UNAMIR mandate plus reinforcements,

demonstrating the international political will to stop further genocide, could have saved hundreds

of thousands of lives.53 It is argued that reinforcements could not have arrived in time to save

most victims’ lives. Perhaps the most telling refutation of his view is the fact that over 1000

heavily armed French and Belgian troops flew into Kigali by April 10 to evacuate their own

nationals. If they had, instead, been used to reinforce UNAMIR, they might have had a powerful

effect in deterring the spread of the genocide. An additional 500 Belgian reserves were available

in Kenya, and 800 more French troops were stationed in central Africa.54 Two hundred and fifty

U.S. Special Operations troops were available in Burundi to assist, if necessary, with the

evacuation of U.S. citizens. There were and are today, tens of thousands of U.S. troops stationed

in Europe, the Persian Gulf, the Indian Ocean, and other places much closer to Rwanda than the

continental U.S.A.

population was only 650,000, 8.27 percent of the population, based on the 1991 census. (cf. note 13), pp 20. However, the most recent count of the dead, carried out locality by locality, yields a figure of over one million dead from 1990 through 1994, with 800,000 dead during the genocide. Associated Press, “More Than One Million Rwandans Killed in 1990's,” NY Times Online News Report, 14 February, 2002. 49 CNN International Diplomatic: The Genocide in Rwanda Revisited. CNN.com transcripts. May 20, 2000. "Dallaire: Secondly, people would come to me and say, yeah, you know, you've got to put it behind you and get on with things. And, you did what you could. Well, you can't Pontius Pilate 800,000 people simply away by saying, well, I did what I could." http://edition.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0005/20/i_dl.00.html 50 Kuperman, Alan J. The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention: Genocide in Rwanda. Brookings Institution Press, 2004. pp viii. 51 Ibid. pp 77. 52 UN Srebrenica immunity questioned. BBC News. June 18, 2008. http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/mpapps/pagetools/print/news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7461310.stm 53 Stanton, Gregory H. The Rwandan Genocide: Why Early Warning Failed. Journal of African Conflicts and Peace Studies, University of South Florida, Vol. 1, Iss. 2, 2009, pp 6-25. pp 16. 54 Melvern, Linda, A People Betrayed. The Role of the West in Rwanda’s Genocide, Zed Books, London, 2000. (cf. note 5) pp 147.

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Even without these reinforcements, according to General Dallaire, the UNAMIR troops

could have used the weapons they had, which were superior to the machetes of the Interahamwe,

to take down the roadblocks by force, and protect Tutsis who had gathered in defensible places.

The fact that the remaining 456 UNAMIR peacekeepers were able to save at least 25,000 lives by

guarding people who had gathered in churches, stadiums, and hotels, leaves the question open

whether the full 2,500 member force could not have saved many more lives had the U.N. Security

Council immediately mandated it to do so. In fact, even the 456 UNAMIR soldiers stayed back in

contravention of UN orders which mandated only a force of 270 soldiers under UNSC resolution

912; therefore technically their stay was illegal, however, they did so voluntarily because they

believed they were doing the right thing and their trust in the UNAMIR Force Commander

General Dallaire.55

In places protected by the 456 UNAMIR volunteers who stayed, most people survived.

Even against the better-armed Presidential Guard, a robust response by UNAMIR might have

deterred plans to extend the genocide. International outrage at attacks on U.N. peacekeepers might

have also helped forge the political will necessary to obtain reinforcements. Instead the U.N.

Security Council, led by the U.S. and the U.K. decided to cut and run. As General Dallaire later

told U.S. State Department officials, "A peacekeeping force that is trying to stop genocide must

expect to take casualties, or it is worthless."56

The major problem from the beginning of UNAMIR was that all but one of the Western

powers were unwilling to send troops to intervene, or even to provide airlift and financing for an

international force. The result was that poorly trained troops from Bangladesh, lacking any

equipment, were the largest contingent, followed by the Ghanaians, who arrived without a single

vehicle. The Belgian force numbered only 420,57 and withdrew within days after the massacre of

ten Belgian soldiers guarding the Prime Minister. The attack was consciously planned to drive out

the Belgians.58 The Hutu Power militants had learned the lessons of Somalia, too – “If you kill

them, they will leave.”59

55 Melvern, Linda. A People Betrayed: The Role of the West in Rwanda's Genocide. Zed Books, 2000. pp 174. "In a clearly illegal act, Dallaire and his deputy, Brigadier Henry Kwami Anyidoho, commander of the Ghanian troops, defied the security Council and 456 men remained. It was a minimum option. Dallaire had asked for a residual force of 1,200, but the Council had agreed only 270. Dallaire gave everyone the option of leaving. Those who decided to stay believed that Dallaire was right and that they did have a viable role. 'We believed in Dallaire',said one of them later,'and we believed in this mission.'The residual force comprised mostly Ghanians, plus forty Tunisians." 56 Stanton, Gregory H. The Rwandan Genocide: Why Early Warning Failed. Journal of African Conflicts and Peace Studies, University of South Florida, Vol. 1, Iss. 2, 2009, pp 6-25. 57 Kuperman, Alan J. The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention: Genocide in Rwanda. Brookings Institution Press, 2004. (cf. note 13), pp 40. 58 Dallaire, Roméo, Cable to General Baril, UNDPKO, 11 January 1994 (Appendix 5). 59 Stanton, Gregory H. The Rwandan Genocide: Why Early Warning Failed. Journal of African Conflicts and Peace Studies, University of South Florida, Vol. 1, Iss. 2, 2009, pp 6-25. pp 17.

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Late in the genocide, France, which had supplied the Rwandan Armed Forces (FAR) with

arms and advisors and may have helped train Interahamwe militias, launched Opération

Turquoise. After getting U.N. authorization60, France sent in Senegalese and French troops on

June 23.61 Although, Opération Turquoise managed to save more than 10,000 lives in western

Rwanda, it was also accused of permitting the leaders of the genocide to escape into Zaire.62

What finally stopped the genocide was the victory by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF),

which took Kigali on July 4th and declared a ceasefire on July 18th. From July 14th to 16th, a

million refugees streamed into Zaire, the fastest migration of people in history. Refugee camps

quickly fell under the control of the Hutu Interahamwe. The RPF committed its own atrocities,

such as the massacre of at least 1000 Hutu holdouts at Kibeho.63 The camps were not emptied

until the 1997 invasion of Zaire by Rwanda, Uganda, and Laurent Kabila. During their march to

Kinshasa, Kabila’s troops and the Rwandan Patriotic Army committed more genocidal massacres

against Hutu refugees in the Kivus, south of Kisangani, and at Mbandaka. The war that then

ensued in the Democratic Republic of the Congo ever since has since cost over two million

lives.64

The Great Lakes Refugee Crisis

In the immediate aftermath of the genocide in Rwanda in April 1994, a mass exodus of

over two million Rwandans began to the neighboring countries of the Great Lakes region (Fig

5.1) of Africa. Many of the refugees were Hutu ethnics fleeing the Rwandan Patriotic Front

(RPF), which had gained control of the country at the end of the genocide. The refugees included

large numbers of Hutu genocidaires themselves involved in the Hutu-perpetrated genocide of

Tutsi. They fled Rwanda, for fear of reprisals by the primarily Tutsi RPF.65 They included

members of the Interahamwe and government officials who carried out the genocide, and now

began to use the refugee camps as bases to launch attacks against the new government led by the

60 UN.Org. UNSC Resolutions 1994. Security Council Resolution 929 (22 June 1994) http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N94/260/27/PDF/N9426027.pdf?OpenElement 61 Melvern, Linda, A People Betrayed. The Role of the West in Rwanda’s Genocide, Zed Books, London, 2000. (cf. note 5) pp 213. 62 Prunier, Gérard. Operation Turquoise: A Humanitarian Escape, in Adelman, Howard and Suhrke, Astri (eds). The Path of a Genocide. The Rwanda Crisis from Uganda to Zaire, New Brunsqick, New Jersey: Transaction, 1999. pp 303. 63 Kuperman, Alan J. The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention: Genocide in Rwanda. Brookings Institution Press, 2004. pp 20. 64 International Crisis Group, Disarmament in the Congo, 14 December 2001, pp 2. http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/africa/central-africa/dr-congo/038-disarmament-in-the-congo-jump-starting-DDRRR-to-prevent-further-war.aspx 65 Mills, Kurt. International Responses to Mass Atrocities in Africa: Responsibility to Protect, Prosecute, and Palliate. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015. pp 63. "These refugees were not Tutsi fleeing the Hutu genocidaires, however. Rather, they were Hutu fleeing the oncoming RPF fighters. In the end, more than two million Hutu refugees fled Rwanda to escape the RPF. About half of these fled to eastern Zaire, with the rest spread among neighboring countries - in particular Tanzania and Burundi. These Hutus included genocidaires - those who had participated in the mass slaughter - and many ordinary Rwandans who played no role in the genocide."

PLATE VI

Fig 5.1 Great Lakes Crisis – Great Lakes Region and the Regional Players

Source: International Committee of the Red Cross. https://www.icrc.org/casebook/doc/assets/images/great_lakes_region-.jpg

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RPF under Paul Kagame.66 The camps in Zaire became particularly politicized and militarized.

The knowledge that humanitarian aid was being diverted to further the aims of the genocidaires

led many humanitarian organisations to withdraw their assistance.67 The conflict escalated until

the start of the First Congo War in 1996, when RPF-supported rebels invaded Zaire and sought to

repatriate the refugees.68

At the beginning of the genocide in April 1994, the Rwandan Patriotic Front began an

offensive from territory in northern Rwanda that it had captured in previous fighting and made

rapid progress and Hutus fled the advancing RPF force. French historian Gérard Prunier asserts:

"Most of the Hutu who had stayed in the country were there because they had not managed to run

away in time."69 In the midst of the chaos of post-genocide Rwanda, over 700,000 Tutsi refugees,

some of whom had been in Uganda since 1959, began their return.70 Contrary to refugee flows in

other wars, the Rwandan exodus was not large numbers of individuals seeking safety, but a large-

scale, centrally directed initiative. The refugees settled in massive camps almost directly on the

Rwandan border, organised by their former leaders in Rwanda. Joël Boutroue, a senior UNHCR

staff member in the refugee camps, wrote, "Discussions with refugee leaders...showed that exile

was the continuation of war by other means."71

The result was dramatic. An estimated 500,000 Rwandans fled east into Tanzania in the

month of April. On 28 - 29th April, 250,000 people crossed the bridge at Rusumo Falls into Ngara,

Tanzania in 24 hours in what the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)

agency called "the largest and fastest refugee exodus in modern times".72 The apparent

organisation of this Rusumo evacuation is seen as evidence that the collapsing government was

behind the large refugee outflows. By May 1994, a further 200,000 people from the provinces of

Butare, Kibungo and Kigali-Rural had fled south into Burundi.73

66 Stephen John Stedman, Fred Tanner. Refugee Manipulation: War, Politics, and the Abuse of Human Suffering. Brookings Institution Press, 2004. pp 99. "At the beginning of 1996, the U.S. Committee on Refugees annual World Refugee Survey also estimated that the actual number of Rwandan refugees in eastern Zaire was approximately 900,000, in contrast to the official UNHCR estimate of 1.1 million. This 1996 estimate includes in the "refugee" count the extremist political leadership, ex-FAR, and Interahamwe." 67 Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, Gil Loescher, Katy Long, Nando Sigona. The Oxford Handbook of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies. OUP Oxford, 2014. pp 274. 68 Laughland, John. A History of Political Trials: From Charles I to Saddam Hussein. Peter Lang, 2008. pp 208. 69 Prunier, Gerard. Africa's World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe. Oxford University Press, 2008. pp 4. "Most of the Hutu who had stayed in the country were there because they had not managed to run away in time." 70 Ibid. pp 2. 71 Ibid. 72 Balzar, John. Rwandans Flee, but Tanzania Closes Border. Los Angeles Times, April 1, 1995. http://articles.latimes.com/1995-04-01/news/mn-49617_1_rwandan-refugees 73 Ibid.

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As the RPF captured the capital of Kigali, the French military set up a safe zone in

southwest Rwanda in June 1994 in what was dubbed "Opération Turquoise".74 It was ostensibly

done to stop the genocide, but the French-European forces prohibited the entry of RPF forces that

were already stopping the genocide and the Hutus who fled, included militants and members of

the ousted government, as well as Hutu civilians.75 The French soon ended their intervention,

leading to the flight of 300,000 people from the Zone Turquoise west towards the Zairian town of

Bukavu in July and August, while a further 300,000 remained in internally displaced person

camps.76 On 18th July 1994, RPF forces captured the northwestern town of Gisenyi and declared a

new government with Pasteur Bizimungu as president and Kagame in the newly created position

of vice-president.77 Gisenyi was the center of the provisional government and its fall caused over

800,000 Rwandans to cross into Goma, Zaire over four days in late July. This outflow was also

highly organised, with administrative structures simply transferred across the border.

By the end of August, UNHCR estimated that there were 2.1 million Rwandan refugees

in neighboring countries located in 35 camps. Around Goma, the capital of North Kivu in Zaire,

five huge camps - Katale, Kahindo, Mugunga, Lac Vert and Sake - held at least 850,000 people.

To the south, around Bukavu and Uvira, thirty camps held about 650,000 people. A further

270,000 refugees were located in nine camps in Burundi, and another 570,000 in eight camps in

Tanzania. The new population around Goma included 30,000 to 40,000 soldiers of the former

Forces Armées Rwandaises (Armed Forces of Rwanda or ex-FAR), fully armed with an intact

officer corps and transport unit, as well as almost all of the politicians. The only other camp

complex to host significant numbers of leaders of the former government was the large Benaco

camp in Tanzania, which held a small number of the exiled military and political leadership. The

exiles chose to base themselves mainly in Zaire because of the support given by President Mobutu

Sese Seko.78

About 140,000 refugees returned back to Rwanda, mostly on their own, in the first three

months after the original exodus. The UNHCR was forced to halt its efforts to repatriate refugees

after both their staff and the refugees were threatened by Interahamwe under the orders of the

exiled leadership. However, by September 1994 rumors of violence by the RPF within Rwanda,

74 Labonte, Melissa. Human Rights and Humanitarian Norms, Strategic Framing, and Intervention: Lessons for the Responsibility to Protect. Routledge, 2013. pp 120. 75 Jørgensen, Knud Erik. European Approaches to Crisis Management. Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1997. pp 103. "Even though the mandate explicitly prohibited the French to act as an interpositional force, the French declared on 4 July after they had established the 'safe humanitarian zone' in the south-western corner of Rwanda, that the RPF would not be allowed to enter the area. Any attempts would be met by force." 76 Binet, Laurence. Genocide of Rwandan Tutsi 1994. Médecins Sans Frontières, 2014. pp 63. 77 Waugh, Colin M. Paul Kagame and Rwanda: Power, Genocide and the Rwandan Patriotic Front. McFarland, 2004. pp 152. 78 Prunier, Gerard. Africa's World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe. Oxford University Press, 2008. pp 24-25.

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combined with tightened control by the Hutu leadership of the camps, drastically reduced the rate

of return and managed to eventually stop it altogether by early 1995.79

The international media coverage of the plight of the refugees eventually led U.S.

President Bill Clinton to call it the "world’s worst humanitarian crisis in a generation" and large

amounts of relief was mobilised. Attention quickly focused on the refugees around Goma. Over

200 aid organisations rushed into Goma to start an emergency relief operation comparable to that

seen in the Yugoslav wars. Until December, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)

received over $1 million monthly. The resources dedicated to the refugees led to a rapid drop in

the mortality rate in late 1994.80 While several humanitarian organisations expressed concern

about mixing the military in humanitarian operations, it quickly became clear that only the

military could create large centralized logistical support with the speed and scale needed to

alleviate a massive humanitarian emergency.

The humanitarian situation was not as acute in the other nations bordering Rwanda,

though still very challenging. Tanzania had a number of refugee camps that had been created for

the civilians fleeing the onset of the Burundian Civil War. Most of these Burundians had returned

to their home country by 199481 so Tanzania had the infrastructure to handle the initial influx of

Rwandan refugees. However, facilities there were also eventually overwhelmed by the sheer

number of people fleeing across the border, requiring emergency humanitarian intervention. The

UN, in the absence of any serious military aid from the US, was forced to open its communication

pathways wider than before and urge other countries to join the efforts. The US agreed to support

these efforts with finance and some equipment. Early in the relief process, US relief planes began

to drop large food packages from the air in hopes of alleviating the suffering in the camps below.

Instead, the opposite occurred, as people were slaughtered by mobs trying to reach the precious

food.

By then, France had established a field hospital at the area of Lake Kivu in an attempt to

help the large numbers of refugees.82 Some of these refugees were Interahamwe leaders and

members of the government who fled the country fearing retaliation from the RPF. The first goal

of the political leadership was to gain control of the food supply. This was accomplished by a

system of "elected popular leaders", who acted as a front for the real leaders and were able to

secure control of the humanitarian aid. The leadership could punish their enemies by withholding

79 Jacob Bercovitch, Judith Fretter. Regional Guide to International Conflict and Management from 1945 to 2003. CQ Press, 2004. pp 103. See also Prunier, Gerard. Africa's World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe. Oxford University Press, 2008. pp 25. 80 Lischer, Sarah Kenyon. Dangerous Sanctuaries: Refugee Camps, Civil War, and the Dilemmas of Humanitarian Aid. Cornell University Press, 2015. pp 95. 81 Roberta Cohen, Francis Mading Deng. The Forsaken People: Case Studies of the Internally Displaced. Brookings Institution Press, 2010. pp 47. 82 Eric A. Belgrad, Nitza Nachmias, The Politics of International Humanitarian Aid Operations. Greenwood Publishing Group, 1997. pp 104.

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aid, reward their supporters by giving it and even make money either by reporting more refugees

than actually existed and selling the surplus or by forcing the refugees to pay a food tax. The

political elite and ex-FAR soldiers were given preferential treatment.83 This led, for example, to

the otherwise curious finding of one humanitarian aid study that 40% of refugees in Kibumba

camp consumed less than 2,000 kcal per person, while 13% received over 10,000 kcal per

person.84 Refugees who disagreed with the structure, who tried to return to Rwanda or those were

too frank with aid workers in discussing the situation were subject to intimidation and murder.85

As the initial acute humanitarian crisis was stabilized, aid workers and others began to

raise concerns about the presence of armed elements in the camps. Rwandese soldiers and the

Interahamwe militia created armed outposts on the outskirts of the refugee camps, while the

camps themselves came under the control of officials of the former government.86 Humanitarian

workers reported that former government officials, especially near Goma, were passing out large

amount of money to the militia to control the refugees on their behalf. Those refugees who tried to

protest were either beaten into submission or killed.

The relief operation began to be accused of "feeding the killers", causing a crisis of

conscience among the agencies, who began to leave.87 The first to leave was Médecins Sans

Frontières, who stated that "this humanitarian operation was a total ethical disaster" as it

rewarded those responsible for the genocide rather than punishing them.88 The International

Rescue Committee, a long-standing implementing partner of the UNHCR, then left stating that

"humanitarianism has become a resource and people are manipulating it as never before.

Sometimes we just shouldn’t show up for a disaster."89 These two organisations were joined by

Oxfam, Save the Children and CARE, completing the departure of the largest and most

professional humanitarian aid organisations upon which UNHCR relied heavily.

In early 1999, Kofi Annan commissioned a report on the United Nations' role in the

genocide, which was due to be published at the end of that year. Till then the most comprehensive

study was the eight-hundred page report written for Human Rights Watch by Alison Des Forges

and published in spring 1999.90 Des Forges documented conclusively both the organised nature of

the genocide and the sloth with which the world reacted. "The Americans were interested in

saving money, the Belgians were interested in saving face, and the French were interested in

saving their ally, the genocidal government," wrote Des Forges. "All that took priority over saving

83 Prunier, Gerard. Africa's World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe. Oxford University Press, 2008. pp 25. 84 Ibid. pp 375. Footnote 97 85 Ibid. pp 26. 86 Cooper, Tom. Great Lakes Holocaust: First Congo War, 1996 1997. Helion and Company, 2013. pp 24. 87 Ibid. pp 12. 88 Shawcross, William. Deliver Us From Evil: Peacekeepers, Warlords and a World of Endless Conflict. Simon and Schuster, 2002. pp 142. 89 Ibid. pp 143. 90 Ibid. pp 144-145.

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lives." She pointed out that to be effective, “international interventions must be prompt, strong,

and smart.”91

Lt Gen Romeo Dallaire (Force Commander of UNAMIR, the United Nations

peacekeeping force for Rwanda between 1993 and 1994) asked Des Forges, "Did the

ineffectiveness of the UN mission in grasping the situation and poor handling of the political,

humanitarian and military response in extremis abet the genocide?" It was an alarming question,

and so was the answer: "I believe it did."92

Despite repeated calls by the UN for international intervention to separate the armed

elements from the civilians in need of assistance, there was little response. Of over 40 countries

that UN Secretary-General Boutros-Boutros Ghali approached to provide peacekeepers, only one

replied affirmatively. The UN eventually resorted to hiring Zairean soldiers to provide a minimum

level of security, a situation that everyone realized was far from ideal.93 In light of their

abandonment by its trusted partners and the insecurity, High Commissioner Sadako Ogata was

asked why UNHCR did not simply leave as well. She replied: “There were also innocent refugees

in the camps; more than half were women and children. Should we have said: you are related to

murderers, so you are guilty, too? My mandate unlike those of private aid agencies obliges me to

help.”94

Both for those organisations that left and that stayed, the post-Rwandan Genocide refugee

crisis became a watershed event that prompted an extensive reevaluation of their mandates and

procedures, and the relative ethical cases for abandonment and continuing aid were hotly debated.

At the same time, France and the World Bank withheld development aid from the new

government of Rwanda until the refugees were repatriated, prompting accusations that the donors

were simply repeating the cycle of poverty that led Rwanda into crisis originally.95

Anglo-French Attitudes and Rivalry

As has been mentioned earlier in the thesis, in the nineteenth century, Britain and the other

European powers limited their imperial aspirations in Africa to the occasional coastal outpost

from where they could wield their economic and military efficacy. Britain's battles over territory

were often fought with the objective of preventing French or German control in Africa rather than

of promoting British economic interests.96 Britain and most other European imperial powers

91 Ibid. 92 Ibid 93 Wilkinson, Ray. Refugees Magazine Issue 110 (Crisis in the Great Lakes) - Cover Story: Heart of Darkness. UNHCR, The UN Refugee Agency, December 1, 1997. http://www.unhcr.org/3b6925384.html 94 Hammerstad, Anne. The Rise and Decline of a Global Security Actor: UNHCR, Refugee Protection, and Security. OUP Oxford, 2014. pp 220. 95 Alqaq, Richard. Managing World Order: United Nations Peace Operations and the Security Agenda. I.B.Tauris, 2009. pp 110. See also Human Rights Watch: HRW report - Leave none to tell the story. https://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/rwanda/Geno1-3-05.htm 96 Collins, Robert O. Europeans in Africa. Knopf, 1971.

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acquired new territory at an extraordinary rate after 1882 including Uganda, which became a

protectorate of the British Empire in 1894.97

When its resident Belgian colonizers introduced independence to Rwanda in 1959, it

arrived in the form of a violent Hutu revolt that saw about 10,000 Tutsi were massacred and

100,000 driven out of the country to exile in Uganda.98 During the 30-year period following

Rwanda's independence, almost half a million Tutsi fled the country, with over 80,000 seeking

refuge in Uganda. Post-independence, the government of Rwanda was supported by France and

indeed this relationship was further strengthened in 1975 with the signing in Paris of the Franco-

Rwandan military agreement of cooperation.99

Uganda was granted independence from its British protectorate in 1962 but, since the UK

held substantial business interests in the country, it continued to maintain strong links with

Uganda post-independence. Indeed the UK played a pivotal role in the military coup of Milton

Obote who was replaced by Major-General Idi Amin Dada as head of the military government in

1971,100 and the later rise of Yoweri Museveni to President of Uganda in 1986. Museveni's

popular National Resistance Anny (NRA) was bolstered by the assistance of 500 Rwandan exiles

in their capture of Kampala and removal of Obote's government from power.101 After President

Museveni's success in the Bush war and coming to power, he and the RPF thus enjoyed tacit

approval from Britain and the United States in their military endeavour.102

The RPF was co-led by Paul Kagame who, in his capacity as Uganda's head of military

intelligence, received training in military tactics and intelligence methods at the US Army's Fort

Leavenworth Command and General Staff College in Kansas from July 1990 onwards.103

Museveni also sent Kagame to Britain for strategic military training.104 Military training for the

guerrilla RPA in Uganda was provided by British forces at its base in Jinja, Uganda.105

97 Breuilly, John. Nationalism and the State. Manchester University Press, 1982. pp 395. 98 Prunier, Gérard. The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers, 1995. pp 56. 99 Howard Adelman, Astri Suhrke. The Path of a Genocide: The Rwanda Crisis from Uganda to Zaire. Transaction Publishers, 2007. "The first Technical Military Assistance Agreement (TMAA) between Rwanda and France was signed on 18 July 1975 under Valery Giscard d'Estaing's Presidency as part of France's attempt to extend its zone of influence beyond its former empire." See also Simons, Marlise. France's Rwanda Connection. The New York Times. July 3, 1994. http://www.nytimes.com/1994/07/03/world/france-s-rwanda-connection.html?pagewanted=print 100 Mwakikagile, Godfrey. Nyerere and Africa: End of an Era. New Africa Press, 2007. pp 311. "Britain also supported the coup against Dr. Obote because he nationalised British companies in Uganda after he adopted socialist policies in pursuit of economic independence." 101 Waugh, Colin M. Paul Kagame and Rwanda: Power, Genocide, and the Rwandan Patriotic Front. Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company Inc, 2004. 102 Oloka-Onyango, J. Uganda's ‘Benevolent’ Dictatorship. Hartford Web Publishing, August 30, 1998. http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/36/503.html 103 Gribbin, R.E. In the Aftermath of Genocide: The US Role in Rwanda. Lincoln, NE: iUniverse, 2005. 104 Cameron, Hazel. Britain's Hidden Role in the Rwandan Genocide: The Cat's Paw. Routledge, 2013. pp 35. "Museveni also sent Kagame to Britain, North Korea and Canada for military training." 105 Ibid. pp 37.

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In October 1990 the army of the Rwandan Patriotic Front invaded Rwanda from southern

Uganda. The Hutu-dominated Rwandan government repelled this attack with the assistance of its

French allies. Many African analysts believe that the order for the October 1990 RPF invasion

could not have been given without the knowledge, approval, and active assistance of the

Pentagon's Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Britain's Secret Intelligence Service (SIS)

commonly referred to as MI-6. Both agencies were heavily engaged in Uganda during this period

of time.106 Such assertions are corroborated by written submissions to the International Criminal

Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).107

Shortly after the 1990 RPF attack on Rwanda, the British High Commissioner in Uganda

was requested to participate in "a community demarche in Kampala" to "bring the Ugandans to

their senses".108 The British High Commissioner recommended to the FCO that such a demarche

"would be both premature and counter-productive ... and could only damage our interests here".109

Throughout the early 1990s, Britain gathered information from, and maintained a close

relationship with, the RPF who had excellent and very strong intelligence machinery inside

Rwanda.110 Throughout the period of the civil war, the British government continued to provide

military training to the Tutsi-dominated guerrilla force in Uganda, whilst the United States

military transported the RPA leadership to the US for advanced military training.111 Documents

reveal that British diplomats in Kampala received intelligence from meetings with senior RPF

rebel leaders during the civil war/ and were fully cognisant of "RPF claims to be able to take

Kigali pretty much as will".112 Such intelligence gathering ensured that Britain was in possession

of sufficient intelligence to permit a clear insight into the deteriorating conditions within Rwanda.

The information forwarded to London provided a reliable, clear perspective of relations and

insecurities within the Great Lakes region throughout the 1990s, and would have permitted the

British to gauge the potential impact of RPF actions on Britain's relations with the government of

France.

106 Madsen, Wayne. Genocide and Covert Operations in Africa 1993- 1999. Lampeter, Ceredigion, Edwin Mellen Press Ltd, 1999. pp 63. 107 Chossudovsky, M. The Geopolitics Behind the Rwandan Genocide: Paul Kagame Accused of War Crimes. Global Research, November 23, 2006. http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-geopolitics-behind-the-rwandan-genocide-paul-kagame-accused-of-war-crimes/3958 108 Collins, Barrie. Rwanda 1994: The Myth of the Akazu Genocide Conspiracy and Its Consequences. Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. pp 64. "A heavily censored UK Foreign Office report from Cullimore states that: .... Meanwhile [redacted] tells me that [redacted] in Kigali have agreed to recommend to capitals that there should be a community demarche in Kampala 'seeking to bring the Ugandans to their senses.' [redacted] agreed that such a demarche would be both premature and counter-productive. It would achieve nothing and could only damage our interests here." 109 Ibid. 110 Cameron, Hazel. Britain's Hidden Role in the Rwandan Genocide: The Cat's Paw. Routledge, 2013. pp 80. 111 Dallaire, R. Shake Hands With the Devil. Random House, Canada, 2004. pp 48. 112 Cameron, Hazel. Britain's Hidden Role in the Rwandan Genocide: The Cat's Paw. Routledge, 2013.

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France, which had political and cultural interests in Rwanda, naturally looked upon this as

a case of an Anglophone country attacking a Francophone country. President Habyarimana was a

close friend of French President Francois Mitterrand and as mentioned earlier in the chapter

France and Rwanda had a military cooperation agreement. It is also suggested that Rwanda was

located on a political fault-line between Francophone and Anglophone East Africa.113

On 18th June 1994, the French government made an announcement of their intentions to

organise, establish and maintain, a "safe zone", in the south-west of Rwanda. At the brink of

defeat and retreat, the news of an intervention from their French allies was broadcast across the

country by the genocidaire Rwandan government, with a consequent increase in their confidence,

and the continuation of their hunt for genocide survivors.114

On 20 June, France sent a draft resolution to the UNSC for authorisation of ‘Operation

Turquoise’ under a two-month Chapter VII mandate.115 After two days of consultations and the

personal approval of the U.N. Secretary General, it was adopted as Resolution 929 (1994), on 22nd

June, with 10 votes of approval and five abstentions. The "multilateral" force consisted of 2,500

troops, only 32 of them being from Senegal and the rest French.116 The equipment included 100

armoured personnel carriers (APCs), 10 helicopters, a battery of 120 mm mortars, 4 Jaguar fighter

bombers, 8 Mirage fighters, and reconnaissance aircraft.117

The 2,500 heavily armed French troops deployed during Operation Turquoise represented

an exclusively French intervention, even though the "Security Council authorised a multinational

force under French command",118 and raised controversy over the legitimacy of the mission. Since

France had been supporting the Hutu-dominated government of Rwanda and since during the

three-month genocide "France remained openly hostile to the (Tutsi-led) RPF",119 the criticism

was centered on the fact that "the real purpose of the 'humanitarian' mission was to save its client

113 Melvern, Linda. A People Betrayed: The Role of the West in Rwanda's Genocide. Zed Books, 2000. pp 24. "Rwanda was important not because French was its second language, but because Rwanda was located on a political fault-line between Francophone and Anglophone East Africa. After the end of the Cold War these divisions enjoyed a new lease of life. France was a major foreign military power-broker in Africa. Rwanda's neighbour was Zaire, a huge country with vast riches, and Rwanda, Burundi and Zaire were all in the Franco-African family." 114 Dallaire, R. Shake Hands With the Devil. Canada, Random House, 2004. pp 426. 115 UN.Org. UNSC Resolutions 1994. Security Council Resolution 929 (22 June 1994). pp 2, para 3. Acting under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations, authorizes the Member States cooperating with the Secretary-General to conduct the operation referred to in paragraph 2 above using all necessary means to achieve the humanitarian objectives set out in subparagraphs 4 (a) and (b) of resolution 925 (1994). http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N94/260/27/PDF/N9426027.pdf?OpenElement 116 Frederick H. Fleitz Jr. Peacekeeping Fiascoes of the 1990s: Causes, Solutions, and U.S. Interests. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002. pp 156. 117 Caplan, Gerald. Rwanda ten years after the genocide: Some reminders of the international response to the crisis. Pambazuka News, February 5, 2004. http://www.pambazuka.net/en/issue.php/142 118 Jonathan C. R and al. Hailed by Hutus, French visit camp in Rwanda. Washington Post, June 26, 1994. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1994/06/26/hailed-by-hutus-french-visit-camp-in-rwanda/d792d1b4-ff4a-47c4-8366-bcedada710a4/ 119 Thompson, Allan. The Media and the Rwanda Genocide. IDRC, 2007. pp 28.

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government that was losing the war with the RPF."120 According to the authoritative account of

Gerard Prunier, French high-ranked military talked about the need to "break the back of the RPF",

so there was an interest in preventing a Rwandan Patriotic Front' victory.121 According to other

voices, like the commander of Operation Turquoise, the imperative task was 'putting the Arusha

Accords back into operation', meaning implementing an agreement which required the RPF to

share power with other parties."122 Thus the intentions behind the French operation remain

questionable as there seem to be a myriad of geo-political reasons including support for the

French allied Hutu government in Rwanda as well as an attempt to restrain the rapid advance of

the RPF in addition to the more overt humanitarian reasons.123

In Gerard Prunier's analysis, President Mitterand was determined to initiate Operation

Turquoise under the perceived prospect of South Africa (the South African Mercenary Groups

Stuart Mills International124 and Saracen International operate in a number of African countries

and did so in the Rwandan Civil War in 1994125; also South Africa was a major supplier of arms

to the Habyarimana regime between 1990-1994126 – a privilege traditionally held by the French)

120 Scherrer, Christian P. Genocide and Crisis in Central Africa: Conflict Roots, Mass Violence, and Regional War. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002. pp 141. "The extremely belated French military intervention of June 23, 1994 (Operation Turquoise) was designed to salvage France's client regime and not, as had been announced, to help the victims of the genocide. France wanted to conduct the operation itself." 121 Prunier, Gérard. The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers, 1995. pp 285. 122 Human Rights Watch.org. Acknowledging Genocide. "Others, like General Jean-Claude Lafourcade, commander of Operation Turquoise, spoke more discreetly of “putting the Arusha Accords back into operation,” meaning implementing an agreement which required the RPF to share power with other parties." quoted from: Assemblée Nationale, Mission d’information commune, Enquête, Tome I, Rapport, pp 306. https://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/rwanda/Geno15-8-02.htm 123 Helton, Arthur C. The Price of Indifference: Refugees and Humanitarian Action in the New Century. OUP Oxford, 2002. pp 148. "While the French forces did not engage the RPF in 1994, it seems clear that the deployment had the effect of slowing the advance of the rebels, who then swept to victory after the French withdrawal. Whether this was the primary motivation of the intervention will remain the subject of historical debate. It seems clear, however, that decision makers were animated by an array of political and strategic factors in addition to the humanitarian consideration. The absence of a genuine multilateral character to the intervention-only Senegal contributed a modest contingent of troops - heightened the possibility and perception of the pursuit of political and strategic objectives in the guise of a humanitarian mission. Even the cover provided by UN Security Council Resolution 929 could not mask the reality of an essentially unilateral intervention." 124 issafrica.org. Pech, Khareen. Chapter 5: Executive Outcomes – A corporate conquest. pp 91. ref 31: N van den Bergh, Personal Interview, EO offices, Wierda Park, May 1998. Stuart Mills no longer exists, since it was sold to Netcare, a private hospital group in South Africa. https://www.issafrica.org/uploads/PEACECHAP5.PDF 125 Ibid. 126 Sheri P. Rosenberg, Tibi Galis, Alex Zucker. Reconstructing Atrocity Prevention. Cambridge University Press, 2015. pp 201. "Rwanda had a number of sources for its weapons: South Africa's state-owned armaments company, Armscor, supplied arms and ammunition worth $5.9 million to the Habyarimana regime in 1992 and 1993. Not only did the transfer of South African arms help Rwanda militarize on its path to genocide, but it was conducted in violation of the arms embargo placed on apartheid South Africa, which would only be lifted after democratic elections in the country in 1994. In addition to 3,000 R-4 automatic rifles and ammunition, the South Africans supplied SS-77 machine guns, heavier Browning machine guns, 1 million rounds of ammunition, 70 hand-held grenade launchers with 10.000 grenades, I 00 60-mm mortars, and a further

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or another "Anglo-Saxon" country's intervention in Rwanda, coupled with criticism from

humanitarian and human rights organisations during the genocide.127 The controversy over

France's decisions was even more acute, since in 1993 "French forces were used to halt an

incursion by fighters of the RPF [and] some of the French troops deployed in Operation

Turquoise had served previously in Rwanda and trained the government's soldiers."128

The French mission, however, created a safe zone in the southwest part of Rwanda,

wherein many Hutu leaders, Rwandan military and civilians retreated129 and, according to most

estimates, saved the lives of 15,000 to 17,000 Tutsi. The downsizing impact, though, was that it

"jeopardized other Tutsi by giving them a false sense of security"130 and also endangered the

retreating UNAMIR I troops, since according to General Dallaire, "the arrival of French troops

led the RPF to retaliate against the UN."131 In her detailed account, Alison Des Forges

emphasized that during the first weeks of the massacre the international community tolerated the

genocide and by the time the tragedy was corning to an end "some 2,500 well-equipped elite

French forces saved 15,000 to 17,000 lives, while the barely 500 UN peacekeepers, poorly

equipped and minimally supplied, protected about twice that number during the course of the

genocide."132

The French troops provided relief operations in the Safe Humanitarian Zone, but the

limited pre-established two-month timetable of the mission induced panic within the Hutu

displaced community and thousands of them fled, crossing the border into Zaire, since they

"chose to take their chances in the camps (refugee) rather than stay and face the RPF."133 The

result was the creation of safe corridors for the fleeing Hutus, which included the Interahamwe

members and the genocidaires, and by the time French troops retreated in August 1994, not a

single genocidaire had been arrested in their safe zone.134 The escape of those responsible for the

massacre had a huge and frustrating impact on the new Rwandan elite, later pushing the

10,000 M-26 fragmentation grenades." referenced from - Human Rights Watch.org. Arming Rwanda: The Arms Trade and Human Rights Abuses in Rwandan War. Januaty 1, 1994. pp 16. https://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/RWANDA941.PDF 127 Prunier, Gérard. The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers, 1995. pp 286. 128 Helton, Arthur C. The Price of Indifference: Refugees and Humanitarian Action in the New Century. OUP Oxford, 2002. pp 147. 129 Charbonneau, Bruno. France and the New Imperialism: Security Policy in Sub-Saharan Africa. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2008. pp 76. 130 Thompson, Allan. The Media and the Rwanda Genocide. IDRC, 2007. pp 28. 131 Boulden, Jane. Responding to Conflict in Africa: The United Nations and Regional Organisations. Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. pp 180. 132 Des Forges, Alison. Leave None to Tell the Story: Genocide in Rwanda. Human Rights Watch, 1999. 133 Wheeler, Nicholas. Global Bystander to Genocide: International Society and the Rwandan Genocide of 1994, in Nicholas Wheeler, Saving Strangers. Humanitarian Intervention in International Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. pp 208-241. pp 237. 134 Caplan, Gerald. "Rwanda: Walking the Road to Genocide", in Allan Thompson (ed.), The Media and the Rwanda Genocide, pp. 20-37. London, Pluto Press, 2007. pp 28-29.

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government in Kigali on the verge of inter-state war with DR Congo135 and leading to dramatic

repercussions for the entire region.

It is argued that the French intervention "worsened the escalating refugee crisis" and that

the organisers of the genocide, "militia leaders and government soldiers found themselves without

food or medicines living side by side with their Tutsi victims"136 in the refugee camps. In terms of

human displacement and human suffering, the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide displayed

approximately one million Hutu refugees who were streaming in the camps around Goma (with

the genocidaires mingled with the civilians)137, thousands of people killed due to a cholera

epidemic in the camps, the destabilization and the breaking out of inter-ethnic violence in eastern

Congo (in the Kivu provinces).

Second Congo War

During June and July 1998 a number of events indicated that relations between Kabila

and the Rwandans had not only seriously deteriorated but had reached a boiling point. Some of

Kabila's collaborators are reported to have concluded that a Rwandan officer was about to

assassinate Kabila during the Independence Day festivities on June 30th.138 James Kabarehe was

personally suspected by Kabila and his now Katangan guards forced the Chief of Staff to enter the

President's office only after having been bodily searched and disarmed.139 A few days later,

Kabarehe was replaced by Kabila's brother in law, Celestin Kifwa. In this atmosphere, Tutsi

families in Kinshasa began to feel insecure and started to leave. Kabila did a lot of traveling

during these crucial days. He visited Namibia and Cuba presumably seeking support given the

momentous divorce which was taking place. On July 27th, the Rwandan mission of cooperation

was ended by the DRC and the Rwandan military was asked to leave immediately. On July 29th,

they flew back to Kigali. A little over a year earlier they had been received as liberators, now

public opinion in Kinshasa vehemently approved of their de facto expulsion.

It is not an exaggeration to say that the next twenty days profoundly changed the history

of Africa and launched the continent on what Gerard Prunier has called the African World War

(Fig 5.2).140 There are at least some similarities with Europe's aptly named, First World Wars. In

both, a series of miscalculations by leaders resulted in untold pain for common people and an

irrevocably changed future. The chronologically laid out events which follow briefly summarize

these developments: It is therefore essential to understand the chronology of events as they

135 Okowa, Phoebe N. "Congo's War: the Legal Dimension of a Protracted Conflict", British Yearbook of International Law, vol. 77, 2007. pp 203-255. 136 Wheeler, Nicholas. "Global Bystander to Genocide: International Society and the Rwandan Genocide of 1994", in Nicholas Wheeler, Saving Strangers. Humanitarian Intervention in International Society. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000, pp. 208-241. pp 237. 137 Off, Carol. The Lion, the Fox and the Eagle. Random House of Canada, 2010. pp 80. 138 Clark, John F. The African Stakes of the Congo War. Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. pp 114. 139 Ibid. 140 Prunier, Gerard. Africa's World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe. Oxford University Press, 2008. pp 72.

PLATE VII Fig 5.2 Participants of the Second Congo War

Fig 5.3 Second Congo War, 1998-2003

Map of DRC after the Lusaka Agreement, 2001

Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/Second_Congo_War_Africa_map_en.png

Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0d/Second_Congo_War_2001_map_en.png

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unfolded on the fateful 2nd of August, 1998. On that day, the Commander of the ANC's 10th

Brigade, one of the best and largest units in the new army stationed in Goma, declares the

destitution of President Kabila.141 He was soon joined by the 12th Brigade in Bukavu.142 Rwandan

army units are then reported to be crossing the border in force.143 In Kinshasa, a fire fight begins

between Congolese Tutsi soldiers who refuse to be disarmed and other FAC largely Katangan,

soldiers. The Tutsi are routed and most are killed although some manage to escape into the bush

(term referring to the African Savannah grasslands)144 west of Kinshasa.145 A pogrom, encouraged

by the Kabila regime, was carried out, against all Tutsi in Kinshasa and other cities.146

On 4th August, in a spectacular cross-continent air lift, a plane full of Rwandan and

Ugandan soldiers led by James Kabarehe landed at Kitona army base located in the Lower Congo

near Cabinda, an Angolan enclave on the Congo border.147 The base held some 10-15,000 former

FAZ soldiers who were being "re-educated".148 Kabarehe and his approximately 150 soldiers

manage to mobilise these troops to join the uprising against Kabila. Later, more troops from the

east join this enterprise.149 Within days, they captured a number of towns and most importantly

the Inga hydroelectric dam where they were able to cut off electricity supplies to Kinshasa as well

as Katanga.150 In an "off and on" manner, Kinshasa was without electricity and therefore without

a flowing water supply.151 In effect, the capital was threatened both by starvation and militarily.

Kabila called on the city's population to arm itself and to defend the capital.152 There was a real

response to this call to arms, but it involved many mob killings of suspected infiltrators, Tutsi,

141 Stapleton, Timothy J. A Military History of Africa. ABC-CLIO, 2013. pp 202. 142 Ibid. 143 Artur Usanov, Marjolein de Ridder, Willem Auping, Stephanie Lingemann, Luis Tercero Espinoza, Magnus Ericsson , Masuma Farooki, Henrike Sievers, Maren Liedtke. Coltan, Congo and Conflict. The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies, 2013. pp 36. 144 Stebbing, Edward Percy. The Forest of West Africa and the Sahara: A Study of Modern Conditions. W. & R. Chambers, Limited, 1937. pp 1. 145 Weiss, Herbert, War and Peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Current African Issues No. 22, Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 2000. Repro Ekonomikum, Uppsala, Sweden, 2000. pp 13. 146 Prunier, Gerard. Africa's World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe. Oxford University Press, 2008. pp 183. "Anti-Tutsi pogroms had started in the streets of Kinshasa, during which hundreds were arrested and dozens killed." 147 Ngolet, François. Crisis in the Congo: The Rise and Fall of Laurent Kabila. Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. pp 22. "On August 4, the rebel strategy took a more spectacular turn when Commander James Kabarebe hijacked a plane belonging to a domestic carrier, Congo Airlines (CAL). The hijacking happened in Goma, where rebels controlled both the city and the airport. The plane was flown to the military airbase of Kitona in the Bas-Congo province, thus opening up a second front in the west." See also Boudreaux, Richard. Angolan Troops Battling Rebels Move Up Congo River. Los Angeles Times, August 25, 1998. 148 Clark, John F. The African Stakes of the Congo War. Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. pp 115. 149 Ibid. 150 Ibid. 151 Ibid. 152 Cooper, Tom. Great Lakes Conflagration: Second Congo War, 1998-2003. Helion and Company, 2013. pp 25.

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mutinous soldiers and simply unfortunate individuals who find themselves at the wrong place at

the wrong time.153

On 20th August, a group of Congolese politicians, who for a wide variety of reasons, and

coming from very different political backgrounds unite in Goma to form the political wing of the

anti-Kabila movement, the Rassemblement Congolais pour la Democratie (RCD).154 The range of

their political backgrounds was very wide, and stretched from former ADFL members to former

Mobutists. Militarily, the Kabila regime seemed doomed. Its best military units joined the

"rebellion", two well prepared former allies, not only invaded from the east but captured the far

west of the country. Kinshasa is in dire straits and threatened by advancing troops coming from

the lower Congo.

On 23rd August, Angola attacks the Rwanda-Uganda RCD positions in the Lower Congo

from its bases in Cabinda and surrounds the anti-Kabila forces.155 Some of the anti-Kabila forces

reached the outskirts of Kinshasa where they were attacked by the population and massacred. The

cross continent maneuver failed, but in the east there were virtually no pro-Kabila forces and the

"rebellion" achieved military control. On 26th August, Zimbabwe sent a military expedition to

Kinshasa to support the Kabila regime.156 Later, Namibia and Chad also sent troops which took

up positions supporting Kabila.157 Some reports also spoke of Sudanese involvement on Kabila’s

side.158 In sum, a war on Congolese soil began which involved, directly or indirectly, a large

number of African states, military establishments, militia, and economic interests.

It is quite evident that the plan for the destitution of the Kabila regime largely emulated

the successful destruction of the Mobutu regime. A military manoeuvre in the Kivus, in the name

of a Congolese group intent on reforming an existing regime, would challenge an isolated and

unpopular president. Indeed, those who started the Second Congo War must have felt that they

were in a far better position than they had been in during the 1996-7 campaign. First, they now

153 Ibid. pp 26. 154 Clarke, John F. The African Stakes of the Congo War. Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. pp 115. See also Tull, Denis. The Reconfiguration of Political Order in Africa: A Case Study of North Kivu (DR Congo). GIGA-Hamburg, 2005. pp 111-112. "Unlike its rival in the northern part of Congo, Jean-Pierre Bemba's Mouvement pour la Liberation du Congo (MLC), and indeed the vast majority of social organisations in Congo, the RCD was not the offspring of a President-Fondateur. Rather, it was an ad hoc coalition of various groups and interests who shared few commonalities. An organisation born out of a conjunction of interests, the RCD was at least as heterogeneous as its predecessor organisation, the AFDL, which had been correctly described as a "coalition of convenience"." 155 Rose Marie Kadende, Paul J. Kaiser. Phases of Conflict in Africa. International Specialized Book Service Incorporated, 2005. pp 94. See also Africa Confidential, Volume 39, Issues 4-25. Miramoor Publications Limited, 1998. pp 10. 156 Burnley, Aaron Price. The Human Toll from African Conflicts: Explaining Conflict Resources. Webster University, ProQuest, 2009. pp 85. 157 Dokken, Karin. African Security Politics Redefined. Palgrave Macmillan, 2008. pp 55. 158 Atzili, Boaz. Good Fences, Bad Neighbors: Border Fixity and International Conflict. University of Chicago Press, 2012. pp 186.

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had a portion (the best according to several observers) of the DRC's army on their side.159 Second,

the officers planning this mission had intimate knowledge of the disposition of the rest of the

army since only weeks earlier they held commanding positions in that army. Of course, there was

the question of Angola, but it is hard to imagine that the Rwandan/Ugandan/RCD planners

imagined that they would confront Angolan military power as an adversary. Again, they probably

compared their position to 1996-7 when Angola, somewhat belatedly, joined them in attacking the

then Kinshasa regime of President Mobutu.160 But, whatever the exact plans were, what happened

did not fit into them and instead of a collapsed Kinshasa regime which was supposed to fall even

more rapidly than its predecessor did in 1996-97, a long and costly war resulted.

There are both striking similarities and dissimilarities, in the 1996 Congo War and

Second Congo war of 1998. The similarities are that firstly, in both wars Rwanda and Uganda,

seeing insurgency movements against their governments used the DRC as a base of operations

and helped launch Congolese rebels with the intention of overthrowing the Kinshasa regime.

Secondly, in both cases, the Kinshasa authorities appealed to the international community,

specifically to the Security Council of the UN, and the OAU, to condemn this "aggression" but

failed. Thirdly, in both wars, most of the fighting was done by foreign forces; and lastly, in both

wars, massive violence was imported into a country which since the mid-1960s had generated

relatively little violence.

The differences between the wars are of course, more telling than the similarities. Firstly,

in the first war, the Kinshasa government was singularly unsuccessful in gaining foreign support

and since its army hardly fought at all, it was rapidly overwhelmed in eight months. In the second

war, the Kinshasa government was very successful in obtaining foreign military and diplomatic

support. Secondly, in the first war the effective foreign armies which really fought were Rwanda,

Uganda and Angola. In the second war, these allies split, with Angola supporting Kabila while

Uganda and Rwanda attempted to overthrow him. So, in addition to getting military support from

Chad, Namibia and Zimbabwe, and probably Sudan, the forces which had been so successful in

defeating Mobutu were now divided and a prolonged, unresolved war ensued. Thirdly, in the first

war, the notion that the war was a "revolution" or a "war of liberation", coupled with generalized

antagonism toward Mobutu, resulted in a considerable amount of Congolese and foreign support

for the "rebel" forces. In the second war, much of the Congolese population was convinced that

they were being invaded by the much disliked Rwandans, Ugandans and in some eyes, simply the

Tutsi. This resulted in very little popular support for the new "rebels". There is a paradox here that

159 IBP, Inc. Congo Republic Energy Policy, Laws and Regulations Handbook - Strategic Information and Basic Laws. Lulu.com, 2013. pp 257. "Most of the better-trained FAC troops belonged to the elite unit of the 10th battalion stationed in Goma. It was this unit, numbering 25,000 men, which launched the renellion on 2 August 1998 from FAC headquarters in Kivu." 160 Weiss, Herbert, War and Peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Current African Issues No. 22, Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 2000. Repro Ekonomikum, Uppsala, Sweden, 2000. pp 14.

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there were more Congolese fighting on both sides in the second war than in the first; but, the first

was seen in much of Africa and in the Congo as a "revolution"161 while, the second is generally

viewed as an "invasion". Perceptions count for more than subtle distinctions. Fourthly and lastly,

in the first war, Mobutu's call to arms produced little response and indeed had a hollow, impotent

ring. Whatever popular support he still had was lost with the declining fortunes of his regime as

his opponents advanced toward Kinshasa. In the second war, Kabila's call to arms produced a

genuine response among the Congolese masses (especially in the cities) and his popularity

soared.162

It should be noted that during the period of conflict with Rwanda and especially after the

beginning of the war, Kabila's approval rating reached 88% at the very moment when his regime

was most vulnerable.163 From having been viewed as something close to a foreign pawn in the

spring of 1997 he had become-at least in Kinshasa-a nationalist hero who was defending the

nation's sovereignty. His subsequent decline in approval must be attributed to the sharp decline in

the standard of living in Kinshasa during this period as well as his continuing-despite his

popularity-refusal to share power with the forces which are still called the non-violent opposition.

But, the cutting edge of the difference between the two wars was not Kabila's popularity

and Mobutu's lack of it. It was the decision of Angola where the Movimento Popular de

Libertação de Angola (MPLA or People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola) Party was in

power, to support Kabila. It is evident that had Angola repeated its actions during the first war, i.e.

somewhat belatedly followed Rwanda and Uganda's lead, the fate of the Kabila regime would

have been sealed even if Kabila's unambiguous ally, President Mugabe of Zimbabwe, had opted

to support him militarily. The reason for this is that Kinshasa would, in all likelihood, have fallen

before such aid could reach the DRC. Angola's decision to, switch sides had a determining impact

not only on the war, but on the entire political evolution of Central Africa.164 Thus, the question

arises as to, why did Angola adopt the policy in question and a number of answers have been

161 Bronwen Everill, Josiah Kaplan. The History and Practice of Humanitarian Intervention and Aid in Africa. Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. pp 148. "In 1996 the DRC was invaded by its neighbours - Rwanda and Uganda - in an effort to eliminate members of the Rwandan armed forces who fled the country after committing genocide in Rwanda in the face of an advancing Tutsi rebel movement led by the current President Paul Kagame. The international community, on humanitarian grounds, forced President Mobutu to allow passage of Rwanda Hutu refugees, some with arm, to enter the DRC. The invasion later turned into a revolutionary movement led by Laurent Kabila to overthrow President Mobutu." 162 Juma, Lawrence. Human Rights and Conflict Transformation in Africa. African Books Collective, 2013. pp 324. "Indeed public opinion surveys conducted by a local polling group BERCI in Kinshasa during 1997 and 1998 show that Rwandan presence was profoundly unpopular and that Kabila's popularity skyrocketed when he ousted the Rwandans." (Nzongola-Ntlaja 2003:242) 163 Country Report: Zambia, Democratic Republic of Congo. Economist Intelligence Unit, Zambia, 1999. pp 30. 164 Rotberg, Robert I. State Failure and State Weakness in a Time of Terror. Brookings Institution Press, 2003. pp 46. "In 1998, however, Angola switched sides, a critical difference. The key to this decisive turnaround lies in the Angolan civil war."

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proposed by astute analysts of the situation. For instance, Colette Braeckman165 suggests that

Angola was motivated first by a rejection of "the arrogance of Kigali and Kampala" at daring to

capture an area of the DRC which abuts Angola and Angolan interests. She also states that the

Angolan reaction was a response to information they had been given that Rwanda and Uganda

had been in contact with the União Nacional para a Independência Total de Angola (UNITA or

National Union for the Total Independence of Angola). UNITA was engaged in a civil war

against Angolan government of the MPLA from 1975 to 2002.166

Yet another argument suggests that old Marxist and revolutionary ties linked Kabila to

Dos Santos and Mugabe.167 There is also the obviously correct point put forward by Gerald J.

Bender168, that all Angolan actions in the DRC must be seen as linked to the war against UNITA.

What all of these pertinent arguments do not answer is what Angola's position and role would

have been had it joined the attack against the Kabila regime. To speculate about this one must

recall that the Angolans were widely reported to have been very critical of Kabila during the

period between the wars, that their request to place their soldiers on the DRC side of the border, in

order to combat UNITA more effectively, had been rejected by Kabila. Finally, there are

persistent rumors to the effect that at least some Angolan officials and officers were informed of

the impending Kitona landing, thus the great shock on the part of the Ugandans and Rwandans

when they were suddenly faced by the Angolan army not as an ally but as an opponent.169

Assuming the latter, the most plausible reason is the belief that an alliance had been

struck between Rwanda and Uganda and UNITA and such a view was supported by both the

reported presence of UNITA leaders in Kigali and Kampala and the recruitment of Mobutist

generals, long allies of UNITA, and politicians into the anti-Kabila alliance.170 If that was seen to

165 Braeckman, Colette. L'Enjeu Congolais (The Congolese Issue). Fayard, Paris, 1999, pp 395. 166 James III, W. Martin. A Political History of the Civil War in Angola: 1974-1990. Transaction Publishers, 2011. pp 7. 167 Haskin, Jeanne M. The Tragic State of the Congo: From Decolonization to Dictatorship. Algora Publishing, 2005. pp 93. "President Robert Mugabe's interests coincide with power and wealth. He is on the one hand, determined to outshine South Africa as the leader of the SADC (South African Development Commission) and, on the other, to strip the Congo of mineral wealth. Mugabe and Kabila are linked due to their Marxist pasts, and they were known to each other before the start of the war. The size of Zimbabwe's forces in the country (guaged at 11,000 in 2002) is second only to Rwanda's." See also Khadiagala, Gilbert M, Lyons, Terrence. African Foreign Policies: Power and Process. Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2001. pp 76. "Finally, there was the long personal friendship that existed between two old comrades in arms, dos Santos and Sassou-Nguesso. During the Cold War period, "Marxist" Congo had been a constant friend to the MPLA regime in Luanda, allowing Congolese territory to serve as a rear base for the flow of Cuban troops and Soviet arms into Angola." 168 Gorman, Robert F. Great Debates at the United Nations: An Encyclopedia of Fifty Key Issues 1945-2000. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2001. pp 313-314. 169 Weiss, Herbert, War and Peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Current African Issues No. 22, Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 2000. Repro Ekonomikum, Uppsala, Sweden, 2000. pp 16. 170 Ian Beckett, Ian F. Beckett. Modern Insurgencies and Counter-Insurgencies: Guerrillas and their Opponents since 1750. Routledge, 2004. pp 245. "In turn, however, Kabila found himself opposed by new guerilla forces after he demanded the withdrawal of Rwandan forces in July 1998. The rebels are backed by Uganda, Rwanda and UNITA, while Kabila has received backing from Zimbabwe, Angola, Chad and Namibia." See also Human Rights Watch Staff. Human Rights Watch World Report 1999. Human Rights

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be true, indeed if it was true, then an alliance with the two former allies could easily be seen as a

trap and very much against the Angolan government's self interest. Indeed, a similar assumption

seems to have been at the base of Rwanda's risky decision to intervene in August 1998. It was

reported, and apparently believed, that Kabila had made an alliance with the ex-

FAR/Interahamwe and was training them. In both cases, the ultimate provocation was cooperation

with the insurgency movement trying to overthrow the government in question. In a world in

which the notion "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" explains many events, nowhere is that

rule more absolute than when it involves insurgency movements. As regards the Angolan

government, it probably overcame its reservations about Kabila when it was convinced that its

insurgency movement-UNITA was in contact with Rwanda and Uganda.

The Second Congo War created an expensive balance of power in Central Africa. Until

2000, neither side had been able to defeat the other; both were expending huge percentages of

their national resources, and that of the DRC on military budgets. The war involved, to varying

degrees of intensity, most of the African continent. This conflict could be analyzed on both

international and internal levels.

The effects of the Second Congo War on the international stage were as manifold. Firstly

whereas the anti-Kabila alliance was restricted to Rwanda, Uganda and to a lesser extent

Burundi,171 (Ethiopia and Eritrea had given some support to Kabila during the first Congo War;172

they were by 1998 preoccupied fighting each other) the support for the Kinshasa government was

very wide. Not only did Angola, Zimbabwe and Namibia send substantial military contingents,

but Sudan and Chad, allegedly with Libyan financial support, also participated militarily.173

Secondly, the South African Development Community (SADC) was divided and in a considerable

crisis because of events in the DRC. Under President Mugabe's leadership, the DRC's-recent-

membership was invoked as a reason why other members should come to the defense of the

Kinshasa government.174 However, President Mandela sought compromise and a diplomatic

Watch, 1998. pp 35. "The rebel Congolese Rally for Democracy drew troops from disenchanted brigades of the Congolese Armed Forces. Its political branch brought together a diverse coalition of anti-Kabila groups, including, in addition to the Banyamulenge, figures from the national opposition and former dignitaries of the Mobutu era. Accusing President Kabila of corruption, nepotism, and failure to bring about democratic reforms, ethnic harmony, and regional stability the rebels vowed to correct these ills and to open the democratization process to other forces. Their bid to remove the government in a lightening campaign was, however, thwarted when forces sent by the governments of Angola, Zimbabwe, and Namibia came to President Kabila's rescue. Their intervention saved the capital Kinshasa from a imminent fall to rebels attacking it from bases in western Congo." 171 Gray, Colin S. War, Peace and International Relations: An Introduction to Strategic History. Routledge, 2013. pp 258. 172 Reyntjens, Filip. The Great African War: Congo and Regional Geopolitics, 1996-2006. Cambridge University Press, 2009. pp 65. "However, while countries such as Eritrea, Ethiopia, Zambia and Zimbabwe offered varying degrees of support to Kabila's rebellion, a brief mention of their role will suffice here." 173 Christopher W. Mullins, Dawn Rothe. Blood, Power, and Bedlam: Violations of International Criminal Law in Post-colonial Africa. Peter Lang, 2008. pp 131. 174 Hentz, James J. Routledge Handbook of African Security. Routledge, 2013. pp 209. "Another problem for SADC was its 1997 admission of the DRC (the former Zaire) as a member state, just after the

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solution to the conflict and the South African government gave strong support to the process

which produced the Lusaka Agreement which has been analysed next in this chapter.

Thirdly, on both sides of the conflict, the foreign countries involved, especially those with

military forces in the DRC, translated their politico-military power into economic advantages.175

Thus, Rwanda and Uganda exploited the diamond, gold and rare metal deposits in Eastern

DRC;176 Angola created a joint venture for petroleum extraction in the Lower Congo and was

involved in the massive diamond trade in Kasai,177 and Zimbabwe gained considerable control

over copper and cobalt extraction in Katanga.178 Fourthly, While seeking to make the war "pay for

itself"179 with varying degrees of success, all the foreign powers involved were, nonetheless,

motivated to seek an advantageous end to the conflict. First, because it never came anywhere near

fully "paying for itself"; second, because the governments of these states all faced some form of

internal oppositions which could have been potentially strengthened by the war. For example, the

ex-FAR/Interahamwe was strengthened by the fact that Kabila mobilised them to fight the

Rwandan government and the RCD.180 The military losses and negative economic consequences

of the war in Zimbabwe strengthened Mugabe's internal opposition.181 Of course, wanting the war

to end would not result in its ending since all the participants desired substantial advantages.

conclusion of the 1996-1997 civil war in which rebel forces with support from Rwandaremoved President Mobutu Sese Seko from power. Although the DRC was a failed state, there was little debate within SADC regarding it becoming a member. SADC membership enabled DRC President Laurent Kabila, who along with the Alliance des Forces Democratiques pour Liberation de Congo (ADFL) had overthrown Mobutu, to call on SADC states to intervene to defend a fellow SADC state against a Rwandan- and Ugandan-supported insurgency that began in 1998." 175 Nest, Michael. Coltan. Polity, 2011. pp 70. 176 Ian Livingstone, D. G. R. Belshaw. Renewing Development in Sub-Saharan Africa: Policy, Performance and Prospects. Psychology Press, 2002. pp 45. "In a report to the UN Security Council, Kabila accused both Uganda and Rwanda of looting the DRC for gold and diamonds. The report alleged that 'men around' Museveni's own brother, General Salim Saleh, were among the main buyers of Congo's gold and diamonds. In Kisangani, Uganda was rumoured to have encouraged a South African mining company to set up operations in 1998, and it first operated in Kisangani and then moved to Gbadolite, near the Yakoma diamond deposits." 177 Professor Gebrewold, Belachew. Anatomy of Violence: Understanding the Systems of Conflict and Violence in Africa. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2013. pp 111. "The involvement of Angola in the Congo conflict is caused not only by the intent to defeat the UNITA rebels. There has been an economic reason behind it. Dos Santos owned a share of the DRC's petroleum distribution and production networks as a reward for Angolan Armed Forces' assistance to DR Congo (ICG 2000: 57). Moreover, thousands of Angolans were involved in illegal diamond mining and trafficking along the border (ARB 1998c: 12996)." 178 Rotberg, Robert I. Transformative Political Leadership: Making a Difference in the Developing World. University of Chicago Press, 2012. pp 158. "Greed begat more greed, and corruption more corruption. Among the motives for Mugabe's decision to send 13,000 Zimbabwean soldiers to bolster support for Laurent Kabila's decaying Congolese regime in 1998 was the opportunity to loot the cobalt, cadmium, copper, and diamond mines of Katanga." 179 Prunier, Gérard. From genocide to continental war: the 'Congolese' conflict and the crisis of contemporary Africa. Hurst, 2009. pp 239. "Zimbabwe: trying to make the war pay for itself. Zimbabwe's basic motivations for being in the Congo had not changed: to block the northward creep of South African influence, particularly at the mining level, and to recoup its initial investment in Kabila's rise to power." 180 Weiss, Herbert, War and Peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Current African Issues No. 22, Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 2000. Repro Ekonomikum, Uppsala, Sweden, 2000. pp 17. 181 Rotberg, Robert I. Transformative Political Leadership: Making a Difference in the Developing World. University of Chicago Press, 2012. pp 158. "By 1999, if not before, Zimbabwe was nearly bankrupt, the

182

Fifthly, unlike the first Congo War, this was a very ‘African’ war.182 There were no Cold

War involvements. The Francophone-Anglophone rivalry, which characterised the First Congo

War, is not to be found in the Second War. If the DRC were to be considered the "French" side

and the Rwandans/Ugandans the "English" side, the line-up of allies did not fit. Zimbabwe and

Namibia, both Anglophone countries would end up being French and Rwanda and Burundi, both

francophone, would end up being English; yet, there are persistent perceptions among many

Africans that the war is linked to secret strategic plans by non-African powers with nefarious

goals. Such views focus especially on the US which is seen as the power behind Rwanda and

Uganda, but there is in fact very little evidence for this.183 The strongest elements supporting this

perception are the credits given to Rwanda and Uganda by the international financial institutions

and the continuing concern with-and guilt over-the 1994 genocide in Rwanda in the US.184

Lastly, the essentially African nature of the conflict has, unfortunately, led to an

expansion of the notion, first represented by the Hutu-Tutsi conflict in Rwanda and Burundi, that

this is a war between the "Bantu" and the "Hamites" or the "Nilotics". As explained in the last

chapter, there is no logical or scientific basis for such a view, (the terms are lingual and there are

Bantu speaking people who are viewed as Hamites and vice versa), the almost racial attitude

which these terms have aroused is creating a deep ideological chasm among Africans.185

In addition to the international effects of the Congo War, there were multiple internal

ramifications of the Second Congo War. The most important impact of the Second Congo War on

internal affairs has been the massive loss of independence by all the Congolese political forces

and a sharp decline in the standard of living of ordinary people. The forces in question can be

described in a very summary fashion as involving the following tendencies: Firstly, the official

government of the DRC, i.e. Kabila and his immediate collaborators were affected militarily and

in many ways diplomatically as this force depended on its allies who fought for its survival and

triumph since August 1998. Kabila had also successfully mobilised the support of the

Interahamwe/ex-FAR and re-armed them. In addition, he created an alliance with the Mai Mai

invasion of the Congo and special payments to so-called war veterans having exhausted the national exchequer and having depleted Zimbabwe of foreign exchange. As a result of this unexpected privation and an increasing internal awareness of corrupt dealings and governmental arbitrariness. Zimbabwe's national trade uunion and some of the hitherto loyal members of the ruling party began to criticize Mugabe and his "bleeding" of Zimbabwe." 182 Weiss, Herbert, War and Peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Current African Issues No. 22, Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 2000. Repro Ekonomikum, Uppsala, Sweden, 2000. pp 17. 183 Clark, John F. The African Stakes of the Congo War. Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. pp 96. 184 Weiss, Herbert, War and Peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Current African Issues No. 22, Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 2000. Repro Ekonomikum, Uppsala, Sweden, 2000. pp 17. 185 Dan Landis, Rosita D. Albert. Handbook of Ethnic Conflict: International Perspectives. Springer Science & Business Media, 2012. pp 394.

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rebels in the Kivus who were very effective guerrilla fighters against the Rwandan/RCD forces in

North and South Kivu.186

Secondly, the non-violent opposition (mentioned in Chapter 4, pp 27) is uncertain as to

how much support it retains. It should be noted that Tshisekedi, who was its most prominent

leader, called for the retreat of foreign forces (i.e. mainly the Rwandans) at a time when Kabila

was still dependent on them. This theme echoed public sentiment. But, later Kabila appeared to

have become the more dramatic symbol of the "get the foreign troops out of our country"

sentiment. On the other hand, the non-violent opposition succeeded in representing sentiments in

favor of an all Congolese, democratically arrived at compromise. The most important institution,

among the opposition groups, the UDPS, had a structure which had a national extension.187 Thus,

in the context of a national dialogue, it did have the potential to emerge as a serious challenger

and competitor to Kabila. Finally, the ethnic factor involved should not be forgotten. The UDPS

was linked to the Kasai Luba188 and Kabila was associated with the Katangans.189 The Kasai Luba

had a score to settle with the Katangans who expelled them in a massive ethnic cleansing exercise

in 1993 from Katanga.190 Some of the personalities involved in this expulsion were close to

Kabila.191 Perhaps more than other Congolese political or military force, the nonviolent

opposition had most to gain from the "new political dispensation and national reconciliation

186 Autesserre, Séverine. The Trouble with the Congo: Local Violence and the Failure of International Peacebuilding. Cambridge University Press, 2010. pp 143. "During the Second War, Mai Mai militias, along with the Rwandan Hutu rebels, functioned as Kabila's main proxy in his battles against the RCD-G and Rwanda. The nomination of a Mai Mai leader as chief of Kabila's ground armed forces eventually formaized this local-national alliance. Mai Mai and Rwandan Hutus also worked hand in hand throughout the eastern provinces. Rwandan Hutus wee sympathetic to the Mai Mai because they shared a common enemy (the Rwandan army), and therefore the Rwandan rebels helped arm, train, and supply Mai Mai soldiers. The two groups often formed mixed armies." 187 Weiss, Herbert, War and Peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Current African Issues No. 22, Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 2000. Repro Ekonomikum, Uppsala, Sweden, 2000. pp 18. 188 John Frank Clark, David E. Gardinier. Political Reform in Francophone Africa. Westview Press, 1997. pp 254. 189 Douglass C. North, John Joseph Wallis, Steven B. Webb, Barry R. Weingast. In the Shadow of Violence: Politics, Economics, and the Problems of Development. Cambridge University Press, 2012. pp 100. See also Turner, Thomas. The Congo Wars: Conflict, Myth and Reality. Zed Books, 2007. pp 177. "In a rally in Kamina (Katanga) opposition candidate Joseph Olenghankoy criticized certain unnamed Congolese for aiding foreigners to 'pillage the country's natural wealth, especially in Katanga'. The attack clearly referred to Kabila, whose father hails from Katanga, where foreign firms have in recent years won mining contracts that offer particularly attractive taxation rates." 190 Minahan, James. Encyclopedia of the Stateless Nations: D-K. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002. pp 971. "In December 1993, the Katangan government declared the political and economic autonomy of Katanga and continued the brutal "ethnic cleansing" of the Kasaians." 191 SouthScan Southern Africa Monthly Regional Bulletin, Volume 14, D. Coetzee, 2005. pp 147. "The message was understood as a specific threat against Kasaians, who had been the victims of pogroms between 1992-1993. Muyambo is popular among the Southern Katangans and is a rival of Gabriel Kyungu, who is from the North and belongs to the late Laurent Kabila's Lubakat ethnic group. In late May this year Southern Katangans accused of participation in a "secessionist plot" were arrested by the airforce commander in chief, John Numbi, a former militia chief during the 1992-1993, and a close collaborator of Joseph Kabila."

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arising from the inter-Congolese political negotiations" which the Lusaka Agreement called for.192

For that process to be truly neutral and successful a substantial UN presence was absolutely

necessary. Thus, the non-violent group and many NGO's were the strongest supporters of a

dynamic, well organised and led, UN mission.193

Thirdly it is significant to note that the RCD was formed after the FAC units in the east

and Rwanda and Uganda moved against Kabila.194 Clearly, what these forces needed, as in 1996,

was a revolutionary movement with credibility among the Congolese and especially among those

in the east who were under its control. It has already been mentioned earlier in this chapter, that

the politicians and intellectuals who came together to form the RCD had extremely different, even

opposed, backgrounds. They found it very difficult to gain acceptance by ordinary citizens in the

areas they controlled and even less in the areas which the Kabila regime controlled.195 In the

Kivus, local militia, the Mai-Mai, almost immediately turned against them.196 In sum, the RCD

was unable to shake off the appearance of being a front for the Rwandans and the Ugandans and

given the rise of intense inter-communal hatreds, they were often seen as the stooges of the Tutsi.

The RCD faced further difficulties; an internal division split the movement into RCD/Goma and

RCD/ML (Mouvement de Liberation formerly identified as RCD/Kisangani) and much acrimony

developed between the two wings.197 In the context of this internal conflict it became evident that

Uganda supported the RCD/ML led by Professor Ernest Wamba dia Wamba and Rwanda

supported the RCD/Goma led by Dr. Emile Ilunga.198 This further exposed the degree to which

192 Lusaka Peace Agreement. Chapter 5, para 5.2. "In order to arrive at a new political dispensation and national reconciliation arising from the inter-Congolese political negotiations, the Parties agree upon the implementation of the following principles" 193 Tremblay, Philippe. The Transition in the Democratic Republic of Congo: A Historic Opportunity. International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development, 2004. pp 12. 194 Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Professor Emmanuel Akyeampong, Mr. Steven J. Niven. Dictionary of African Biography, Volumes 1-6. OUP USA, 2012. pp 423. "Bemba also had his own considerable personal fortune to help fund his war with Kabila's government. He joined forces with an older rebel group, the Rassamblement Congolais pour la Democratie (RCD), which had formed after the initial revolt began in the summer of 1998." 195 Jürgen Ossenbrügge, Mechthild Reh. Social Spaces of African Societies: Applications and Critique Concepts about "transnational Social Spaces". LIT Verlag Münster, 2004. pp 217. "Thirdly, a string of processes and events has further deepened the cleavage between the indigenous communities and the kinyarwanda-speaking populations, this time the Tutsi: the alignment of the Banyamulenge with the invading RPA, the numerous atrocities committed by them, the perception of a Tutsi dominance in the wake of Kabila's taking of power, the second rebellion and the subsequent occupation of Eastern Congo by the RPA, and most importantly the perception of the RCD as Kigali's puppets, coupled with the exploitation of Congolese resources and widespread human rights abuses by what is perceived to be a Tutsi coalition." 196 Tull, Denis. The Reconfiguration of Political Order in Africa: A Case Study of North Kivu (DR Congo). GIGA-Hamburg, 2005. pp 189. 197 Cunningham, David E. Barriers to Peace in Civil War. Cambridge University Press, 2011. pp 71. "In March 1999 the nominal leader of the RCD, Ernst Wamba dia Wamba, moved his headquarters from Goma to Kisangani, leading to a split in the organisation. Two groups then fought the conflict: RCD-Goma, which was backed by Rwanda, and RCD-Liberation Movement (RCD-ML), which was led by Wamba and received Ugandan support." 198 Haer, Roos. Armed Group Structure and Violence in Civil Wars: The Organisational Dynamics of Civilian Killing. Routledge, 2015. pp 129. "His faction is often called, RCD-Kisangani (RCD-K) or RCD-Wamba. THe left-over faction was taken over by Dr. Emile Ilunga, which is referred to as RCD-Goma or

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these movements were dependent on their foreign sponsors, even though many of the leaders very

genuinely opposed Kabila because they believed he was establishing a dictatorship. Finally, when

the Ugandan and Rwandan armies fought against each other in Kisangani-resulting in Congolese

civilian casualties and much property destruction, for reasons linked both to economic interests

and to the competition between the two wings of the RCD, the Congolese nationalist credentials

of both wings were further compromised.

Fourthly, a new anti-Kabila movement called the Mouvement pours la Liberation du

Congo (MLC) started which also received Ugandan support.199 However, the MLC had one

serious advantage over the two RCD's, its leader originated from the northern area in which it was

active and its support was largely regionally homogeneous.200 In effect, it was the only one of the

three rebel movements which was not linked to any imagined or real Tutsi connection201 and it

was militarily successful in two ways; in the areas which it conquered there was no indigenous

militia willing to fight it, and, this movement was responsible for the retreat of the Chadian troops

which had operated out of Mobutu's old palace at Gbadolite.202 The MLC was headed by Jean-

Pierre Bemba whose father was one of the richest members of what used to be Mobutu's inner

circle.203 All of the militarized, anti-Kabila movements mentioned above would later sign the

Lusaka Agreement. However, both the non-violent opposition and the Mai-Mai, or indeed any of

the militia movements, were not part of the Lusaka process or agreement.

One can wonder which, if any, of the leaders are likely to gain from the anticipated

national dialogue which will presumably lead, at some time in the future, to elections. By the year

1999, the country faced an uncertain future as it was anybody's guess as to which of the

mentioned groups' leaders would gain from the expected national dialogue which would hopefully

lead to elections one day. The two RCD's had failed to create broad grass roots organisations and,

just the RCD. This latter faction is one of the longest lives and one of the strongest rebel groups and is primarily supported by Rwanda." 199 Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Professor Emmanuel Akyeampong, Mr. Steven J. Niven. Dictionary of African Biography, Volumes 1-6. OUP USA, 2012. pp 423. "Bemba formed the Mouvement de Liberation du Congo (MLC) in May 1998 under the aegis of the Ugandan military. Bemba allowed the Ugandan army access to valuable mineral resources in north-eastern Congo in return for military and logistical support." 200 Weiss, Herbert, War and Peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Current African Issues No. 22, Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 2000. Repro Ekonomikum, Uppsala, Sweden, 2000. pp 18. 201 International Court of Justice. Affaire Des Activités Armées Sur Le Territoire Du Congo (République Démocratique Du Congo C. Ouganda). United Nations Publications, 31-Jan-2008. "The DRC thus maintains that the RCD was created by Ugnada and Rwanda on 12 August 1998, and that at the end of September 1998 Uganda supported the creation of the new MLC rebel group, which was not linked to the Rwandan military. According to the DRC, Uganda was closely involved in the recruitment, education, training, equipment and supplying of the MLC and its military wing, the ALC" 202 Ngolet, François. Crisis in the Congo: The Rise and Fall of Laurent Kabila. Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. pp 31-32. "The MLC then succeeded in taking control of a vast area around Dulia in between Buta and Mumba. In the process, they killed 200 Chadian troops sent from Gbadolite in the far north of Equateur." 203 Stearns, Jason. Dancing in the Glory of Monsters: The Collapse of the Congo and the Great War of Africa. Public Affairs, 2012. pp 223. See also Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Professor Emmanuel Akyeampong, Mr. Steven J. Niven. Dictionary of African Biography, Volumes 1-6. OUP USA, 2012. pp 422-423.

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as mentioned earlier, were tainted by their close collaboration with their foreign sponsors. The

MLC operated in a sparsely populated area, was allegedly linked to Mobutism and had no grass

roots support outside the area it controlled, with Ugandan help, and that too militarily. Kabila's

popularity as a nationalist leader who stood up to foreign invasion had certainly risen as

previously noted but once peace was re-established, his authoritarian methods, his favoring people

of Katangan origin204 and the sharp decline in standards of living which have occurred since 1998,

would all place his leadership in some jeopardy.

In 1999 all the leaders, (with the exception of those heading the non-violent opposition),

controlled the areas of the Congo which they and their foreign supporters captured militarily and

from which they drew substantial benefits. But there was one difference between the areas

controlled by Kabila and those controlled by the two RCD's which should be emphasized; they

both had internal oppositions but Kabila's was non-violent, whereas the two RCD's faced the

growing guerrilla attacks and power of the Mai-Mai who increasingly cooperated with the

Interahamwe.205 This would naturally have the effect of reducing the flexibility any of the leaders

regarding the national dialogue; the RCDs would have a more pressing need to end the status quo

than the Kinshasa regime. This would especially be so if the national dialogue is linked to the UN

presence and the disarming of militia groups.

As fate would have it the leadership of the internal parties to the Second Congo War

turned out to be less than adequately compromising during the planned for national dialogue as

did the foreign parties which were in control in various parts of the Congo just before the Lusaka

Peace Agreement. As is well known, these regions became economic resources for these countries

which helped pay for their military investment and promised, in the future, to become important

sources of revenue. The joint ventures between the Kabila regime and commercial interests of

Angola and Zimbabwe had, by then, not covered their military costs nor resulted in repayment of

debts incurred by the Kinshasa authorities. Much the same is true for the foreign allies of the anti-

Kabila forces of Uganda and Rwanda who were the economic beneficiaries of their control over

the diamond, gold and precious metal exports which were mined in the zones they controlled. If

the national dialogue and "new political dispensation"206 in the DRC which was called for in the

Lusaka Agreement were to produce a new regime, it was unclear whether the loans and special

204 Africa Confidential, Volume 47. Miramoor Publications Limited, 2006. pp 11. See also International Crisis Group. Katanga: the Congo's forgotten crisis. International Crisis Group, 2006. pp 6. 205 Tull, Denis. The Reconfiguration of Political Order in Africa: A Case Study of North Kivu (DR Congo). GIGA-Hamburg, 2005. pp 130. "To comprehend the practical necessity of this endeavor, it is useful to recount a few basic facts on the situation prevailing in Kivu in 1998/99: before and after the outbreak of the RCD rebellion in August 1998, guerilla warfare and hit-and-run attacks of local Mai Mai militias and the Rwandan Hutu rebels against the "Tutsi" authorities - first the AFDL/RPA, then the RCD/RPA - were in full swing." 206 Lusaka Peace Agreement. Ceasefire Agreement. "Taking note of the commitment of the Congolese Government, the RCD, the MLC and all other Congolese political and civil organisations to hold an all inclusive National Dialogue aimed at realising national reconciliation and a new political dispensation in the DRC;"

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arrangements would continue to be honored or whether the mineral products of the eastern DRC

would continue to flow through to Kampala and Kigali.

UN and the Lusaka Peace Agreement

The Lusaka ceasefire agreement was signed by the Heads of State of the DRC, Namibia,

Rwanda, Uganda and Zimbabwe and Angola’s Minister of Defence on 10th July 1999; by the

Uganda-backed Movement for the Liberation of Congo (MLC) on 1st August 1999; and by 50

people representing both factions of the Congolese Rally for Democracy (RCD) on 31st August

1999.207 The RCD and MLC only endorsed the agreement after initially having refused to sign.208

At the time of its signing, the Lusaka Ceasefire Agreement (Fig 5.3) represented a significant

breakthrough in the resolution of the DRC conflict. For the first time, all the parties had met and

agreed on establishing processes that would lead to the peaceful resolution of their differences and

possible political reconstruction of the Great Lakes region. However, a number of challenges

arose as a result of the nature of the agreement and the process of its establishment.

Firstly, the very complex nature of the Lusaka Agreement quickly revealed itself as a

stumbling block to its operationalisation. It was a very complicated plan for peace.209 Broadly

speaking, the conflict in the DRC initially engaged two opposed sides. One was the Kinshasa

government, its Angolan, Namibian and Zimbabwean allies and various paramilitary forces. The

other was a diverse set of rebel groups (the most notable being the RCD and the MLC) and their

Rwandan and Ugandan sponsors. While Uganda and Rwanda claimed that their intervention in

the DRC was based on the need to secure their western borders from incursions by rebel groups

based in eastern Congo, they were later accused of having another motive: plundering that

country’s natural resources (Fig 5.4). Thus, the combination of actors, issues and dimensions

(regional, national and local) made the conflict in the DRC all but intractable. This could explain

in turn the lack of collective will on the part of Western governments to attempt any settlement of

the conflict, despite the human cost that it represented. It may be that the failure of the West to

intervene exacerbated an already explosive situation. It would be an understatement to say that

this conflict, which had the highest death toll of any since the Second World War, did not receive

207 Letter Dated 23 July 1999 from the Permanent Representative Of Zambia to the United Nations Addressed to the President of the Security Council. 23 July, 1999. S/1999/815. United Nations. 208 Koko Sadiki. The Lusaka Ceasefire Agreement and Stability in the DRC. African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD), Conflict Trends, Issue 3, pp 32-37, 2007. pp 33. 209 Weiss, Herbert, War and Peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Current African Issues No. 22, Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 2000. Repro Ekonomikum, Uppsala, Sweden, 2000. pp 1. “The Lusaka Agreement is a very complicated plan for peace resting on six essential elements: First that the sovereignty of the DRC in its present frontiers and that of its neighbors is agreed upon. Second, that an all inclusive process will be undertaken by the Congolese in order to establish a new political order. This process is to have a neutral convener and is to include all parties to the internal dispute whether armed or not, and they are to meet as equals. Third, the parties agreed to cooperate in addressing the security concerns of each state. Fourth, the agreement specifically calls for the disarming of militia groups in the DRC. Fifth, it calls for the withdrawal of all foreign forces from the DRC. Sixth, it calls for a Chapter VII UN peacekeeping force to ensure implementation of the Agreement.”

PLATE VIII

Fig 5.4 Natural Resources in the DRC

Fig 5.5 MONUC Deployments, November 1999

Source: https://www.newsecuritybeat.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Minerals+and+Forests+of+the+DRC1.jpg

Source: Report of the UN Secretary-General on the preliminary deployment in the DRC to the UN Security Council 1116 (S/1999/1116), 1st November, 1999.

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as much attention from international donors and the media as the US war on Iraq or, earlier, the

conflicts in the Balkans.210

The creation and signing of the Lusaka agreement was achieved with much difficulty. A

split in the RCD delayed the process, with each side at first refusing to acknowledge the other’s

assumed status at the peace talks as well their authority to sign. Another delay occurred when the

former head of the RCD, Ernest Wamba dia Wamba, sat down in the seat reserved for the RCD

representative, claiming his right to do so as leader of the movement. There were intensified

demands for changes to the Lusaka agreement, which threatened the basis of the peace process.

Many hurdles had to be overcome before the preparatory talks in Gaborone could take place.

Most of them were created by Laurent Kabila, who signed the Lusaka agreement only under

extreme military pressure.211

The main reason Kabila had been forced to negotiate was the weakening commitment of

his allies to continuing the war, and the growing pressure on his regime. At the time of the signing

of the Lusaka ceasefire, he faced the threat of imminent military defeat. The agreement may have

been his only way of clinging to power. Despite his claims of victories, he had not recovered any

of the territory taken by the rebels and their allies since the beginning of the war. However, it was

clear from the beginning of the talks that Kabila’s position would be further weakened by the

ceasefire agreement. Critical observers in Kinshasa noted that Kabila was ‘not even’ a dictator,

and had not been in control of his country at any moment since he had taken over. He had proved

himself unable to build a sustainable regime in Kinshasa.212

Yet this did not prevent Kabila from attempting to manipulate the negotiations and the

National Dialogue process to his advantage. These developments all contributed toward

undermining the agreement. Indeed, it can be argued that the Lusaka agreement was imposed,

even forced upon the signatories, metaphorically at gunpoint, rather than being offered as a

symbolic “olive branch”. Another obstacle to the negotiation process was the difficult choice of a

mediator who would be trusted and accepted as non-partisan by all signatories.213 It would be five

months before a former president of Botswana, Sir Ketumile Masire, was accepted in this role.

210 DRC: Conflict Deadliest since World War II. IRIN - DRC, April 8, 2003. "In a survey carried out between August 1998, when the war began, and November 2002, the IRC estimated that at least 3.3 million Congolese died. The agency said its study showed the mortality rate in the DRC to be higher than UN reports for any other country in the world." http://www.irinnews.org/news/2003/04/08/conflict-deadliest-world-war-ii-aid-agency 211 Jakkie Cilliers and Mark Malan, Peacekeeping in the DRC: MONUC and the road to peace. Monograph no.66, Halfway House: Institute for security studies, October 2001. pp 65. 212 International Crisis Group. North Kivu – Into the Quagmire ? An overview of the Current Crisis in North kivu. Kivu Report N°1. 13 August 1998. pp 9. 213 E Fourie and H Solomon, Preventive Diplomacy in Angola and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Africa Institute of South Africa, 2002. pp 15.

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Kabila refused all cooperation with Masire, requesting the appointment of a new facilitator and

even seeking to launch his own dialogue to circumvent the Lusaka process.214

The accord was brokered at a time when the military situation had reached a stalemate.

The rebels and the uninvited Rwandan and Ugandan forces had had to admit the failure of their

blitzkrieg215 strategy, and no longer hoped to topple Kabila. For his part, the Congolese president

had failed to push them out of the DRC. In addition, all the signatories could perceive the political

benefits arising from different provisions of the peace accord. Rwanda and Uganda gained

acknowledgement of the security threats that they claimed had triggered their intervention; the

DRC was given confirmation that the invading forces had an obligation to withdraw. In this way,

all of the belligerent states secured a regional commitment to deal with their national security

concerns. As far as the rebels were concerned, they obtained international recognition and an

agreement that weakened President Kabila’s position by granting them equal status in the political

negotiations that were to follow.216 In other words, the signing of the ceasefire agreement was

much more the result of opportunistic moves by each party than a reflection of a general

commitment to reaching a political settlement of the conflict.

The Lusaka agreement stipulated that all air, land and sea attacks were to cease within 24

hours of the signing, and that immediately afterwards, all forces would disengage and redeploy.

Inter-Congolese negotiations involving the DRC’s government, the armed opposition (the RCD

and MLC) and the political (unarmed) opposition would then be held. These would lead, within

90 days of the signing of the agreement, to “a new political dispensation and national

reconciliation in the DRC”.217 In the meantime, the UN would have deployed a peacekeeping

mission mandated, among other tasks, to assist with the disarming of foreign armed groups in the

DRC. In fact, an annexure to the agreement listed nine rebel movements from Rwanda, Angola,

Uganda, and Burundi said to be using DRC territory as a rear base from which to harass their

214 Karen Guttieri, Jessica Piombo. Interim Governments: Institutional Bridges to Peace and Democracy? US Institute of Peace Press, 2007. pp 179. 215 Prunier, Gerard. Africa's World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe. Oxford University Press, 2008. pp 181. "These were brave words indeed, but it was now obvious that Kabarebe's Blitzkrieg had failed." See also Gobbicchi, Alessandro. Globalization, Armed Conflicts and Security. Rubbettino Editore, 2004. pp 180. 216 The Agreement on a Cease-fire in the Democratic Republic of Congo. International Crisis Group (ICG), DRC Report N°5, 20 August 1999, pp. 4–17. 217 Lusaka Peace Agreement. Article III, para 19. "On the coming into force of the Agreement, the Government of the DRC, the armed opposition, namely, the RCD and MLC as well as the unarmed opposition shall enter into an open national dialogue. These inter-Congolese political negotiations involving les forces vives shall Iead to a new political dispensation and national reconciliation in the DRC. The inter-Congolese political negotiations shall be under the aegis of a neutral facilitator to be agreed upon by the Congolese parties. All the Parties commit themselves to supporting this dialogue and shall ensure that the inter-Congolese political negotiations are conducted in accordance with the provisions of Chapter 5 of Annex 'A'."

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respective governments.218 The dispersal of these ‘negative forces’219 (Negative forces is a term

used in the Lusaka Cease-fire Agreement to describe armed groups other than the signatories of

the treaty, both government forces and RCD-MLC rebels who were operating in or from the

territory of the DRC)220, some of which had been involved in the perpetration of the 1994

Rwandan genocide, was intended to pave the way for three desirable outcomes. These were the

orderly withdrawal of all foreign forces, the re-establishment of state administration throughout

the Congolese territory, and the implementation of measures to normalize the security situation

along the country’s borders. The conflict in the DRC, and the resolution of each of the thorny

issues which had caused it, was thus expected to be resolved within 360 days.221

Needless to say, the implementation differed somewhat from this highly optimistic

programme. As in any peace implementation process, a key issue was the kind of mechanisms

that would be set up to enforce the agreement.

The almost immediate collapse of the Lusaka Agreement is well known. By October

Kabila’s forces had begun to push eastwards, while Rwanda and the RCD-Goma tightened their

grip on the strategic diamond town of Mbuji-Mayi. Both sides insisted they were merely

responding to violations by the enemy.222 The stalemate lasted almost a year and a half. The

manner in which the Lusaka agreement was reached contributed significantly to its failure,

because it largely froze the armies in their positions, but did not stop the fighting. The agreement

was swiftly drained of a substantial amount of its content and was treated merely as a reference

document when the parties found themselves with very few other options.223

The terms of the Lusaka accord provided a double system for enforcing the agreement: a

joint military commission (JMC) and a peace-support operation led by the UN.224 The JMC was

to be composed of two representatives from each party, and placed under a neutral chairman

appointed by the OAU.225 Answerable to a political committee composed of the Ministers of

218 Ibid. Annex 'C'. "Armed groups", means forces other than Government forces, RCD and MLC that are not signatories to this agreement. They include ex-FAR, AFF, LRA, UNRF II, NALU Interahamwe militias, FUNA, FDD, WNBF, UNITA and any other forces. 219 Lusaka Peace Agreement. Ceasefire agreement. "Determined further to put to an immediate halt to any assistance, collaboration or giving of sanctuary to negative forces bent on destabilising neighbouring countries" 220 Scherrer, Christian P. Genocide and Crisis in Central Africa: Conflict Roots, Mass Violence, and Regional War. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002. pp 296. 221 Ibid. Annex 'B'. para 20. "Disarmament of Non-Military Personnel - D-Day + 360 days." 222 E Fourie and H Solomon, Preventive Diplomacy in Angola and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Africa Institute of South Africa, 2002. pp 5. 223 Scramble for the Congo: Anatomy of an ugly war. International Crisis Group Africa Report No 26, 20 Dec, 2000. pp 28. 224 Rogier, Emeric. Cluttered with Predators, Godfathers and Facilitators: The Labyrinth to Peace in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Working Paper Series, Netherlands Institute of International Relations 'Clingendael", Conflict Research Unit, July 2003. pp 16. 225 Lusaka Peace Agreement. Chapter 7, para 7.2. "The Joint Military Commission shall be a decision making body composed of two representatives from each Party under a neutral Chairman appointed by the OAU in consultation with the Parties."

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Foreign Affairs and Defence of the parties, the Commission was granted a far-reaching mandate.

It was to be responsible for monitoring the ceasefire and investigating potential violations;

assisting in and checking the disengagement of military forces; working out mechanisms for, and

overseeing the disarmament of armed groups; and, finally, monitoring and verifying the

withdrawal of foreign forces. In short, the JMC was made the key verification body of the

implementation process.226

Although the Commission expected to be assisted by UN peacekeepers in fulfilling its

mandate, it and the OAU were responsible for peacekeeping operations pending the deployment

of this force.227 Even after the UN contingent arrived, the JMC would remain the main decision-

making body. Because of the composition of the Commission, the belligerents were both parties

and judges. As nicely summarized by the International Crisis Group (ICG), the belligerents were

made into peacekeepers; an idea elaborated after a proposal by South Africa to set up a

peacekeeping force from the warring parties themselves.228 Especially when decisions should be

made by consensus, as within the JMC, such a system requires a good deal of trust, good faith and

commitment from the parties involved, and risks failure if any of these conditions are lacking.

The latter was the case in the DRC.

Another constraint on the functioning of the JMC was significant operational and

organisational difficulties. The Commission experienced chronic shortages of resources, which

first delayed the sending of the OAU observers that the JMC expected to rely upon, and

eventually prevented their deployment. Furthermore, for security reasons and because of the

rebels’ reluctance to move to the capital, the JMC could not be relocated from Lusaka to

Kinshasa. Finally, the Commission was left to operate without a full-time chairman for no less

than nine months. Thus, despite UN assistance (and the two draft plans for withdrawal and

disarmament, demobilization and reintegration or ‘DDR’ that the Commission drew up) the JMC

226 Ibid. para 7.4. “The mandate of the Join Military Commission shall be to :- a. establish the location of Units at the time of the Cease-fire; b. facilitate liaison between the Parties for the purpose of the Cease-fire; c. assist in the disengagement of forces and the investigation of any cease-fire violations; d. verify all information, data and activities relating to military forces of the Parties; e. verify the disengagement of the military forces of the Parties where they are in direct contact; f. work out mechanisms for disarming armed groups; g. verify the disarmament and quartering of all armed groups; h. and verify the disarmament of all Congolese civilians who are illegally armed; and i. monitor and verify orderly withdrawal of all foreign forces.” 227 Lusaka Peace Agreement. Annex 'A', Point 1.2. "Until the deployment of United Nations/Organisation of African Unity (UN/OAU) observers, the cessation of hostilities shall be regulated and monitored by the Parties through the Joint Military Commission. With the deployment of UN/OAU observers, the responsibility of verification, control and monitoring of the cessation of hostilities and subsequent disengagement shall be reported through UN/OAU." 228 Scramble for the Congo. Anatomy of an Ugly War. International Crisis Group (ICG), Africa Report N°26, 20 December 2000, pp 70.

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could hardly play the leading peacekeeping role specified for it in the Lusaka agreement.229

Neither, however, could the UN mission.230

The Lusaka ceasefire agreement requested the UN to set up an operation in the DRC that

was meant to ensure, in collaboration with the JMC, the implementation of its provisions. Chapter

8 of the agreement designed an exhaustive and ambitious mandate for this force, in which it was

required to perform peacekeeping and peace enforcement functions.231 The former involved

monitoring the ceasefire, investigating violations, and supervising the disengagement,

redeployment and withdrawal of foreign forces. The latter undertaking involved the disarmament

of armed groups. Although the agreement did not spell out how the UN force might “track down

and disarm”232 these combatants, it requested that MONUC be mandated under Chapter VII of the

UN Charter, meaning that the peacekeepers should be allowed to use coercive means to execute

their tasks.233 According to the provisions of the Lusaka ceasefire agreement, the peacekeepers

would also screen the disarmed fighters for mass killers, perpetrators of crimes against humanity

and other war criminals. It would hand over suspected génocidaires to the International Criminal

Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), while repatriating the other soldiers.

In marked contrast to the ambitious brief given to the peacekeepers by the agreement, the

UN responded by adopting a far more cautious approach. While recognizing that the problem of

foreign armed groups lay at the core of the conflict, from the outset both the Secretary-General

and the Security Council discarded the idea that the peacekeepers should undertake the forcible

disarmament of soldiers as envisaged234 by the Lusaka signatories.235 This option appeared too

229 Karl R. DeRouen, Uk Heo. Civil Wars of the World: Major Conflicts Since World War II, Volume 1. ABC-CLIO, 2007. pp 134. 230 Ibid. 231 Lusaka Peace Agreement. Chapter 8, Point 8.1. "The UN in collaboration with the OAU shall constitute, facilitate and deploy an appropriate force in the DRC to ensure implementation of this Agreement." 232 Ibid. Article III, Point 22. "There shall be a mechanism for disarming militias and armed groups, including the genocidal forces. In this context, all Parties commit themselves to the process of locating, identifying, disarming and assembling all members of armed groups in the DRC. Countries of origin of members of the armed groups, commit themselves to taking all the necessary measures to facilitate their repatriation. Such measures may include the granting of amnesty in countries where such a measure has been deemed beneficial. It shall, however, not apply in the case of suspects of the crime of genocide. The Parties assume full responsibility of ensuring that armed groups operating alongside their troops or on the territory under their control, comply with the processes leading to the dismantling of those groups in particular." 233 Ibid. Article III, Point 11a. "The United Nations Security Council, acting under Chapter VII of the UN Charter and in collaboration with the OAU, shall be requested to constitute, facilitate and deploy an appropriate peacekeeping force in the DRC to ensure implementation of this Agreement; and taking into account the peculiar situation of the DRC, mandate the peacekeeping force to track down all armed groups in the DRC. In this respect, the UN Security Council shall provide the requisite mandate for the peace-keeping force." 234 Lusaka Peace Agreement. Chapter 8, para 8.2.1 (d). "Supervise disengagement of forces of the Parties as stipulated in chapter 2 of this Annex" 235 Rogier, Emeric. The Labyrinthine Path to Peace in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Institute for Security Studies, 2004. pp 5. See also Schwartz, Stephanie. Youth and Post-conflict Reconstruction: Agents of Change. US Institute of Peace Press, 2010. pp 87. "There were a number of Logistical and political reasons for pursuing a voluntary program, not the least of which was that the United Nations did not expect

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risky and too costly.236 As mentioned earlier in the thesis, it was also unrealistic, given the

reluctance of UN member countries to contribute troops for such a mission. In addition, if the

understandably more willing and more able Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA) had failed to defeat

the armed groups, the UN reasoned that there could be no military solution to this problem.

Instead, the Secretary-General outlined a strategy for the voluntary DDR of former combatants.237

The fighters would surrender willingly, induced to do so by the wide publicity given to the

benefits of the programme or ‘peace dividends’ and by the measures (in particular the granting of

amnesty)238 taken by their countries of origin to facilitate their repatriation.

Thus, it can be said that a major cause of the violent conflict in the DRC was the presence

of armed insurgents from Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi fighting their own battles on Congolese

soil. The second pillar of the Lusaka peace agreement – the disarmament, demobilisation,

repatriation, reintegration and resettlement (DDRRR) of the non- Congolese armed groups,

required equally serious attention.239 (This was the prerequisite for the third pillar, the withdrawal

of foreign troops, which would seal a sustainable peace between the DRC and its neighbours and

within the DRC itself.) The most prominent of the non-Congolese armed groups were the

predominantly Hutu rebel forces, such as the Armée de Libération du Rwanda (AliR), led by men

who had been the masterminds of the Rwandan genocide of 1994. They had been supported by

the government in Kinshasa because the government lacked a sufficient military strength to resist

the occupying forces of Rwanda and Uganda.

The primary duty of the UN mission to the DRC (MONUC) was to observe the

implementation of the Lusaka ceasefire agreement, not to disarm the negative forces, or to protect

the civilian population in zones vacated by the parties to the conflict.240 The timetable assigned to

MONUC (Fig 5.5) under the Lusaka agreement also appeared to be a massive flight of fancy: it

called for the disengagement of forces within approximately 14 days, and set many other

untenable tasks to be accomplished within a very short period. Among them were the observation

and monitoring the cessation of hostilities; supervision of the disengagement of forces and

withdrawal of foreign troops; weapons collection; and the overseeing of humanitarian aid and the

to be able to rally the necessary number of troops for a long-drawn-out military campaign that was likely to suffer significant casualties." 236 Schwartz, Stephanie. Youth and Post-conflict Reconstruction: Agents of Change. US Institute of Peace Press, 2010. pp 87. 237 Ibid. "While it is clear that the Lusaka Accord sanctioned a forcible demobilization program, in practice the secretary-general and the Security Council required that the UN-administered DDRRR program be based on voluntary participation." 238 Report of the UN Secretary-General on the DRC/MONUC. S/2001/970, 16 October, 2001. para 59–83. 239 Disarmament in the Congo: Jump-starting DDRRR to prevent further war. International Crisis Group Africa Report, No.38, 14 December 2001. pp ii. See also UN Missions.org - MONUSCO Mandate http://monusco.unmissions.org/Default.aspx?tabid=10725 240 Dr. Rusamira, Etienne. The problem of the disarmament of the negative forces in the Democratic Republic of the Congo: A critical analysis of possible options. Strategic Review for Southern Africa, Vol. XXIV, No.2, November 2002. pp 65.

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protection of civilians. MONUC was also expected to engage in a Chapter 8 peace enforcement

mission, in which it would track down, disarm and rehabilitate members of ‘armed groups’, which

were not signatories to the agreement. The reality was that MONUC’s success was entirely

dependent on one condition: that the various groups, belligerents and irregular forces were going

to co-operate. That this requirement was not met proved to be a major obstacle.

The Lusaka agreement’s major flaw may have been to entrust the signatories with too

much initial responsibility with regard to disarmament, given the level of suspicion that clouded

talks and negotiations and subsequent encounters between the parties. None of the signatories and

parties to the conflict had ever shown a real political commitment to put an end to the war through

peaceful negotiation. However, the violent nature of the conflict demanded that talks had to be

pursued with the utmost urgency. The manner in which the Lusaka agreement was concluded

reflects that the agreement was hastily put together, to fulfill the need for an immediate cessation

of hostilities. Yet four years on and many more victims later, bullets and barrages of gunfire

continued in defiance of that ceasefire.241 Many analysts also believe that the parties signed the

agreement to hide their real intentions. The warring parties may have used the agreement as a

pretext to continue the war on the basis of ‘self-defence’, if fully convinced the other party would

violate the agreed-upon ceasefire.242

Various other issues that contributed to the conflict were not effectively addressed by the

agreement. An important factor is that individuals and factions may receive both material and

psychological rewards in the form of political power, status and wealth from their part in the

conflict, which may be lost when peace comes.243 Violence has become a rational instrument for

the acquisition of material benefits. The strategic role that the diamond town of Mbuji-Mayi and

similar locations played indicates where the belligerents’ priorities lie. A UN panel of experts

investigating the exploitation of the DRC’s natural resources released a report in April 2001

accusing Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi of ‘mass-scale looting, in the DRC.244 Ugandan President

Museveni’s family is said to own shares in diamond mines in the DRC.245

In the final analysis, however, the voluntary strategy chosen by the UN did not seem any

more realistic than the enforcement option designed in Lusaka. First, none of the nine armed

groups had participated in the Lusaka negotiations or later subscribed to the agreed provisions.

This obviously cast a shadow over their willingness to surrender. Second, while the principle of

offering amnesty to the combatants was agreed upon during the Lusaka talks, the (suspected)

241 M. Malan and H. Boshoff. A 90-day plan to bring peace to the DRC? An analysis of the Pretoria Agreement of 30 July 2002. Institute for Security Studies Occasional. Paper No. 61, September 2002. 242 Institute for Global Dialogue, Resolving the DRC conflict through internal dialogue, Global Dialogue Volume 4.3 December 1999. 243 Mitchell, Christopher. The Structure of International Conflict. St. Martin's Press, 1989. pp 190. 244 Solomon, Hussein. South African foreign policy, preventive diplomacy and the false promise of conflict resolution, South African Journal of International Affairs, vol.9, No. 2. 2002. 245 Turner, Thomas. The Congo Wars: Conflict, Myth and Reality. Zed Books, 2007. pp 40.

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perpetrators of the 1994 genocide were excluded from its application.246 Understandable though

this alteration might be, it could only act as a deterrent to disarming for those most likely to be

handed over to the ICTR. Thirdly, successful DDR would compel state actors to cease supplying

weapons and logistical support to the groups to be disarmed. However, the DRC government

continued to support and rely upon the ‘negative forces’, while the rebel movements were kept

alive and active by their respective Rwandan and Ugandan sponsors.247 Fourth, the lack of data

concerning the armed groups hampered the DDR process: it complicated the planning of

activities, and fuelled controversy over the actual number of combatants to be disarmed. Finally,

the continued unrest and insecurity in the rebel-held areas obviously created an environment not

conducive to voluntary surrender of arms. The UN’s cautious approach was also justified by the

adverse conditions within which the peacekeepers would have to operate. As the UN Secretary-

General emphasized,

“the huge size of the country, the degradation of its infrastructure, the intensity of its climate, the intractable nature of some aspects of the conflict, the number of parties, the high levels of mutual suspicion, the large population displacements, the ready availability of small arms, the general climate of impunity and the substitution of armed force for the rule of law in much of the territory combine to make the Democratic Republic of the Congo a highly complex environment for peacekeeping”.248

Although he warned that in the light of these factors the mission would have to be large

and expensive, Kofi Annan recommended a gradual deployment in three phases. As a first step,

90 military liaison officers would be dispatched to the national capitals of the region and to the

rear bases of all the belligerents to ‘test the water’ and prepare the ground for further

246 Lusaka Peace Agreement. Article III, para 22. "There shall be a mechanism for disarming militias and armed groups, including the genocidal forces. In this context, all Parties commit themselves to the process of locating, identifying, disarming and assembling all members of armed groups in the DRC. Countries of origin of members of the armed groups, commit themselves to taking all the necessary measures to facilitate their repatriation. Such measures may include the granting of amnesty in countries where such a measure has been deemed beneficial. It shall, however, not apply in the case of suspects of the crime of genocide. The Parties assume full responsibility of ensuring that armed groups operating alongside their troops or on the territory under their control, comply with the processes leading to the dismantling of those groups in particular." See also Sindjoun, Luc. The Coming African Hour: Dialectics of Opportunities and Constraints. African Books Collective, 2010. pp 239. "Even though other parties agreed to sign the Lusaka Ceasefire Accord, some rebel groups were excluded from the peace process and these groups included Ugandan rebels, Burundian rebels, UNITA, and militia groups operating from the DRC, particularly the Hutu Militia." 247 Waugh, Colin M. Paul Kagame and Rwanda: Power, Genocide and the Rwandan Patriotic Front. McFarland, 2004. pp 134. "Almost from the moment of signature, therefore, the Lusaka Peace Agreement proved unsatisfactory. In addition to the multiplicity of actors, each with their own interests at stake, the core bilateral issue between Kabila's DRC forces and Kagame's RPA remained: Rwanda had signed on condition that the ex-FAR and interahamwe be disarmed and sent home; this, however, was an increasingly difficult requirement for the DRC to satisfy, not least because by this stage the "negative forces" from Rwanda had been to a large extent integrated into the Congolese army." 248 Report of the UN Secretary-General on the preliminary deployment in the DRC. S/1999/790, 15 July, 1999. pp 4, para 15.

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deployment.249 Second, 500 military observers would take up positions in the field in order to

perform traditional peacekeeping functions.250 It was only in the third stage that a full-fledged

peacekeeping operation, intended to assist the parties to implement the Lusaka agreement

(including the provisions relating to the foreign armed groups) and protecting UN personnel,

would be set up.251 The logic underlying this concept of operations was that the UN’s presence

would expand as conditions in the field, as assessed by the Secretary-General, allowed.

Accordingly, it meant that the UN’s presence would not improve the security situation, but rather

that the security conditions would determine the extent of the UN’s presence. This gradual

approach ensured that the UN deployment would be a slow and laborious process.

The first 18 months following the signing of the Lusaka ceasefire agreement proved to be

highly complicated for the UN mission in the DRC (called ‘MONUC’ according to its French

acronym). Not only did it have to cope with poor security conditions, but it also faced restrictions

on its freedom of movement from all the belligerents, in particular from the DRC government.

President Kabila had many grievances against the UN. Claiming that his country was being

invaded, the Congolese leader criticized the UN peacekeepers for failing to protect the DRC

against the “aggressors”. In his view, MONUC had no reason to deploy in government-controlled

territory, but should serve as an interposition force and concentrate exclusively on rebel-

controlled areas so that it could escort foreign armed forces back to the border.252 The Congolese

president was even more assertive after the UN Security Council enacted Resolution 1304, which

accused Rwanda and Uganda of having violated the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the

DRC and demanded that they withdraw their forces immediately.253 Elaborating on this resolution

(which had been instigated by the French government), Kabila went so far as to question the

validity of the Lusaka ceasefire agreement and to seek a revision of the terms on which

MONUC’s presence in the DRC was based.254 255

Kabila’s obstructiveness was not the only difficulty the UN mission faced. MONUC’s

operations were hampered by serious logistical constraints,256 which led the Secretary- General to

request a considerable expansion of the mission; this raised the numbers involved to 5,537

249 Ngolet, François. Crisis in the Congo: The Rise and Fall of Laurent Kabila. Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. pp 90. 250 Ibid. 251 Report of the UN Secretary-General on the preliminary deployment in the DRC. S/1999/1116, 1 November, 1999. pp 9, para 45. 252 Report of the UN Secretary-General on the preliminary deployment in the DRC. S/2000/888, 21 September, 2000. pp 8, para 47-48. 253 United Nations Security Council Resolution 1304. Adopted by the Security Council at its 4159th meeting. 16 June, 2000. pp 1, para 4. "Reaffirming the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and of all States in the region." 254 Report of the UN Secretary-General on the preliminary deployment in the DRC. S/2000/888, 21 September, 2000. pp 12, para 78. 255 Cedric Hilburn Grant, R. Mark Kirton. Governance, Conflict Analysis and Conflict Resolution. Ian Randle Publishers, 2007. pp 291. 256 Yearbook of the United Nations 2002. Bernan Press. United Nations Publications, 2004. pp 110.

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military observers and peacekeepers. 257 Quite apart from the unwillingness of the parties to co-

operate, the persistent insecurity, difficult terrain and degraded infrastructure meant that units of

soldiers were required to assist in the deployment of military observers. The Security Council

authorised the required expansion in Resolution 1291 of 24th February 2000.258 This logistical

reinforcement should not, however, lead to a misreading of MONUC’s nature. It remained in

essence an observation mission mandated to monitor the implementation of the ceasefire and to

supervise the disengagement and redeployment of the parties’ forces.

While the Lusaka ceasefire was repeatedly violated by all parties in 2000,259 these

confrontations did not alter the military balance significantly. It was the stalemate that caused the

main belligerents to adopt the disengagement plan that had been foreseen in the Lusaka agreement

and requested by the UN Security Council in Resolution 1291, on 8th April 2000 in Kampala.

Drawn up by MONUC and slightly amended by the JMC and the political committee, the plan

called for the withdrawal of all forces to a distance of 15 kilometres from the confrontation line,

and the creation of a 30 kilometre wide zone of disengagement.260 This plan, however, required

that the parties to it should relinquish their mutual suspicions (for example that the redeployment

might not be reciprocal, or might be used as an opportunity to gain territory by the enemy). Its

effective implementation was halted by renewed outbreaks of fighting and the decision by the

DRC government261 to suspend all deliberations on the subject.262

The warring parties nonetheless revisited the Kampala plan in Harare on 6th December

2000, and agreed to a new programme for withdrawal. The Harare sub-plan delineated a three-

step process, according to which all parties would disengage to new defensive positions, from

which all foreign forces would withdraw to assembly areas before returning to their respective

countries. At the time, it was estimated that there were approximately 20,000 Rwandan and

10,000 Ugandan troops, 12,000 Zimbabwean, 7,000 Angolan and 2,000 Namibian soldiers in the

DRC.263

257 Haskin, Jeanne M. The Tragic State of the Congo: From Decolonization to Dictatorship. Algora Publishing, 2005. pp 117. 258 United Nations Security Council Resolution 1291. Adopted by the Security Council at its 4104th meeting. 24 February 2000. pp 3, para 4. "Authorizes the expansion of MONUC to consist of up to 5,537 military personnel, including up to 500 observers, or more, provided that the Secretary-General determines that there is a need and that it can be accommodated within the overall force size and structure, and appropriate civilian support staff in the areas, inter alia, of human rights, humanitarian affairs, public information, child protection, political affairs, medical support and administrative support, and requests the Secretary-General to recommend immediately any additional force requirements that might become necessary to enhance force protection." 259 Kabila rejects Lusaka accord. BBC News, 23 August, 2000. 260 Yearbook of the United Nations, Volume 54. United Nations Publications, 2002. pp 126. 261 Ngolet, François. Crisis in the Congo: The Rise and Fall of Laurent Kabila. Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. pp 274. 262 Report of the UN Secretary-General on the preliminary deployment in the DRC. S/2000/888, 21 September, 2000. pp 12, para 75. 263 Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Organisation Mission in the DRC. S/2001/128, 12 February, 2001. pp 5, para 32-35.

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The inter-part negotiations and re-assessment of the ground situation would continue until

2003, however since that time period is beyond our purview, we shall restrict ourselves to the

developments that occurred till December 2000. The true deficiency of the Lusaka dialogue

process lay in its attempt to mitigate the crisis by creating new institutions without looking at the

internal causes of the situation. These were the breakdown of the state and the collapse of the

political, economic, and social dimensions of the lives of the Congolese people. This environment

of disorder subsequently affected the entire surrounding region; judged by the theory of conflict

termination, settlement strategies and structure of negotiations, the Lusaka peace agreement has

been more of a failure than a success.

The way negotiations are carried out is almost as important as what is negotiated. The

choreography of how one enters negotiations, what is settled first and in what manner is

inseparable from the substance of the issues. The Lusaka Agreement has proved to be important,

not only as a solution to the conflict in the DRC but also as a route towards peace. Yet, the Lusaka

agreement has been a flawed agreement on many fronts.

The Lusaka Ceasefire Agreement was born out of a desperate attempt to end the conflict

in the DRC. The agreement was negotiated on idealistic and overly optimistic terms; yet on many

occasions negotiations took place in bad faith and amidst the backdrop of continuous fighting

among the disparate participants. The agreements were only partially implemented on many

occasions. None of the parties to the conflict are or have been capable of dealing with opposition

through any means other than war or repression. Thus the notion of power sharing is foreign to

them, and the prospect of a government of national unity in the DRC may never fully appeal. One

of the other problematic aspects was that the facilitator of the internal peace process, Sir Ketumile

Masire, operated parallel to, rather than as part of, the peace mission in the DRC. The divergence

between the speed with which MONUC wished to act and the much slower process necessitated

by the ICD led to irritation within MONUC.264

Additionally, many UN staff share a conviction that local actors will do not act according

to the broadly liberal principles of the UN, including democracy, free-market economic policies,

and human rights, which are perceived to be the surest form of protection against conflict

recidivism.265 Moreover, there is a widespread belief within the UN that the lack of liberal

264 Jakkie Cilliers and Mark Malan, Peacekeeping in the DRC: MONUC and the road to peace. Monograph no.66, Halfway House: Institute for security studies, October 2001. pp 72. 265 This view is based on democratic peace theory and its domestic variant, liberal peacebuilding. See. for example, Daniel Philpott, "Introduction: Searching for Strategy in an Age of Peacebuilding," in Daniel Philpott and Gerard F. Powers, eds., Strategies of Peace: Transforming Conflict in a Violent World (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), pp. 3-18; Roland Paris. At War's End: Building Peace After Civil Conflict (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004); Freeman, "The Right to Self-determination," pp 358; Oliver P. Richmond, "UN Peace Operations and the Dilemmas of the Peacebuilding Consensus," lnternational Peacekeeping II, no. I (Spring 2004): 83-101; UN. "An Agenda for Peace: Preventive Diplomacy, Peacemaking and Peace-keeping," UN Doc. A/47/277-S/24111 (1992); Boutros Boutros-Ghali, An Agenda for Democratization (New York: UN Department of Public Information, 1996); UN, A More

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political and social systems, corruption and economic inequality, and a lack of human rights

protections are partly or even primarily to blame for conflict in the first place, and many UN staff

believe that local actors will, if left to their own devices, revert to undemocratic, sectarian, and

inhumane practices. This belief in a lack of local liberalism means that UN staff are reluctant to

devolve decision making power to local actors, as doing so may undercut the UN's ability to

realise its goal of liberalising the host country in order to establish security and build peace.266

Many UN documents and reports advocate local ownership on the basis of its ability to

enhance legitimacy and sustainability, but they remain silent on how to build ownership in

practice. Most efforts tend to be unplanned and incoherent, and most UN staff members, while

asserting their commitment to local ownership, remain vague about how they translate that

commitment into practice, usually emphasizing that national actors are somehow involved. As a

result, different staff engages in different practices at different times, with activities ranging from

meetings with local actors to public information campaigns and trainings. However, these actions

are rarely targeted exclusively or explicitly at creating local ownership, and UN staff fails to

specify how they coordinate these efforts with one another. Moreover, UN staff makes few, if

any, attempts to monitor whether these practices actually create a sense of ownership from the

perspective of local actors.

In practice, this implies that the UN may actually distance itself from government, the

political elite, and major power holders, as the latter are most likely to have initiated, ordered, or

condoned violence, war crimes, and human rights violations.267 The Report of the Secretary-

General on Peace building in the Immediate Aftermath of Conflict notes that, while the state is

important, the government may be a transitional body that has been appointed rather than elected,

and as such "may not be fully representative or recognized by the population," adding that it may

also have been involved in human rights abuses or atrocities.268

First, many UN officials argue that such elites are the main national actors who will

continue the peace building process following the UN's departure and, thus, they are

indispensable to sustainability. It therefore is their capacity that must be reinforced, rather than

that of the sub national actors or underrepresented groups emphasized in liberal ownership.

Indeed, though it recognizes that the post conflict governments may lack legitimacy, the

Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility (New York: UN, 2004); UN, "Report of the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations" (Brahimi Report) UN Doc. A/55/305-S/2000/809 (2000); UN, "In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security and Human Rights for All," UN Doc. A/59/2005 (2005). 266 Alex Martin and Peter Wilson. "Security Sector Evolution: Which Locals? Ownership of What?" in Timothy Donais, ed., Local Ownership and Security Sector Reform (Zurich: LIT Verlag, 2008), pp 84. 267 Reno, William. "Bottom-up Statebuilding?" in Charles Call with Vanessa Wyeth, eds., Building States to Build Peace. Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2008. p. 155. 268 Report of the Secretary-General on peacebuilding in the immediate aftermath of conflict. A/63/881-S/2009/304, Para 11. http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/63/881

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Secretary-General's Report on Peace building in the Immediate Aftermath of Conflict also urges

that capacity building "be targeted particularly at strengthening national leadership."269

The UN has repeatedly emphasised the need to ensure that progress in the political sphere

(the Inter-Congolese Dialogue or ICD) is made simultaneously with the military aspects: the

withdrawal of foreign forces and the disarmament, demobilisation, reintegration and repatriation

or resettlement of armed groups. The repeated failures of the ICD raised serious doubts about the

framework of the Lusaka agreement, whose three pillars are intertwined. This meant that the

absence of one could cause the collapse of them all. Thus without the disarmament of the negative

forces, the withdrawal of foreign troops was not seriously pursued, which resulted in the failure of

many of the agreements that were undertaken during the ICD. A permanent mechanism for

security and defence co-operation between the Congo and its neighbours and bolstered by sound

bilateral agreements has been suggested as the only viable way to guarantee that the DRC will not

become a source of destabilisation.270

The true deficiency of the Dialogue process lay in its attempt to mitigate the crisis by

creating new institutions without looking at the internal causes of the situation. These were the

breakdown of the state and the collapse of the political, economic, and social dimensions of the

lives of the Congolese people. The DRC peace process is very fragile;271 in fact it was described

as one of Africa’s most difficult peace deals yet.272 Without external intervention that is both

internationally supported and robust, the peace process will likely stagnate and regress,

culminating in cycles of violence in the Great Lakes region.273 The war has also disrupted internal

human security with an estimated 4 million people that are internally displaced.

♦♦♦♦

269 Ibid. Para 19. 270 Storm clouds over Sun City: The urgent need to recast the Congolese peace process. International Crisis Group Africa, May 2002. pp 19. 271 Mwesiga Laurent Baregu, Chris Landsberg. From Cape to Congo: Southern Africa's Evolving Security Challenges. Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2003. pp 246. 272 Cedric Hilburn Grant, R. Mark Kirton. Governance, Conflict Analysis and Conflict Resolution. Ian Randle Publishers, 2007. pp 291. "The difficulty of implementing the Lusaka Accords was compunded by the radical position of the Rebels and the Kabila government." 273 H. Boshoff and M. Rupiya. Delegates, Dialogues and Desperadoes: The ICD and the DRC peace process, African Security Review, 12(3), 2003 pp 29-37. pp 31.