Rwandan troops began pulling out of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) on Wednesday, bringing to an end a joint military operation that temporarily saw the sworn enemies fighting for the same cause.
DR Congo allowed Rwandan troops to enter Congolese soil late last month in order to hunt down the remnants of an extremist Hutu militia accused of orchestrating the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Tutsis during Rwanda’s 1994 genocide.
At the end of the 100-day slaughter, the Hutu fighters fled across DR Congo’s border, setting up bases in the country’s forested hills.
PHOTO: AFP
Lieutenant-General John Numbi, who headed the operation, said the month-long offensive had been a success, even if members of the militia were still at large.
Numbi, a Congolese, said at a military parade marking the end of the operation: “The enemy has not been completely wiped out, but their ability to operate has been greatly reduced.”
He said 153 Hutu combatants were killed, 37 were captured and 103 were repatriated to Rwanda.
Rwanda has long accused DR Congo of offering refuge to the Hutu militia and twice invaded the country in the 1990s, plunging the Central African nation into war. DR Congo, in turn, has accused Rwanda of funding a Tutsi-led rebel group. The group, based in eastern DR Congo, said its aim was to stamp out the Hutu extremists, but instead they have been accused of atrocities on Congolese civilians.
That DR Congo allowed Rwanda to enter its territory marked a major turning point.
Analysts say one of the key reasons DR Congo acquiesced is because Rwanda promised to arrest Laurent Nkunda, the warlord heading the Tutsi rebel group. He was arrested Jan. 22 by the Rwandan military, two days after an estimated 4,000 Rwandan troops entered DR Congo.
Nkunda had long been rumored to be a puppet of the Rwanda’s Tutsi-led government and the relationship between the two was detailed in a recent UN report.
Meanwhile, the withdrawal has stoked fears that Hutu rebels will step up reprisals against civilians and retake ground they lost during the offensive.
The operation has seen the most concerted pressure on the rebels in years but diplomats question whether it will end years of violence. Thousands of rebels remain in the bush, farming, mining and living off local villagers.
The pullout has prompted fears within the UN’s biggest peacekeeping force that the mainly Hutu Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) rebels, who have mostly avoided clashes with the joint force, will seek revenge.
“The planned pullout of [Rwandan] troops raises concerns about the protection of the civilian population, given the limited capacity and professionalism of [Congolese] troops,” an internal UN memorandum read.
“Although the FDLR has mostly vacated the areas upon the arrival of the joint forces, it is likely that they are waiting in the bush for the forces to retreat and then come back to retaliate on civilians perceived as being traitors,” it said.
The UN is investigating numerous attacks on civilians blamed on the FDLR. New York-based Human Rights Watch says the the rebels have massacred more than 100 civilians accused of betraying them since the start of the operations on Jan. 20.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to