DRC rebels force radio off air
2006-02-01 09:01
Dakar - Rebels in eastern Congo forced a local radio station off the air after a wave of fighting and looting in the troubled central African nation, said reports.
A United States-based human rights group urged Congolese authorities and United Nations peacekeepers to arrest renegade ex-army commander Laurent Nkunda, whose fighters were allegedly responsible for the recent outbreak of clashes in the area.
New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said Radiotelevision La Colombe, the only radio station in the small town of Rutshuru, shut down on Sunday after rebels looted equipment and threatened reporters working there.
Eight combatants killed
Rebels also robbed a guesthouse housing journalists "who fled in fear of their lives".
Fighting between government troops and rebels loyal to Nkunda broke out in the area around Rutshuru, located near Congo's eastern border with Rwanda, on January 18. At least eight combatants were reported killed in the clashes.
New York-based Human Rights Watch said that after a brief period of calm, fighting resumed again over the weekend.
The radio station belonged to the governor of the North Kivu province. It broadcasts local news well as Radio France Internationale transmissions in the Francophone country.
UN deploys peacekeepers
Nkunda gained notoriety after his forces briefly seized the key eastern city of Bukavu, further to the south on the shores of Lake Kivu, amid several days of fighting in 2004.
Human Rights Watch urged Congo's government and UN peacekeepers deployed in the mineral-rich nation to arrest Nkunda, who it said had been wanted on war crimes charges by the government since September.
Alison Des Forges, senior adviser to the Africa division of Human Rights Watch, said: "An arrest warrant was issued against Nkunda for war crimes, crimes against humanity and insurrection months ago, but the police and army have done nothing about arresting him.
"So long as Nkunda is at large, the civilian population remains at grave risk."
Rebels backed by Rwanda
Human Rights Watch said Nkunda's whereabouts were known to UN peacekeepers and Congolese authorities. The group didn't say where Nkunda was believed located, but said he had made frequent visits to the eastern town of Goma, on the Rwandan border.
Nkunda was a commander of rebels backed by neighbouring Rwanda during Congo's 1998-2002 war, which drew in the armies of half a dozen African nations.
Human Rights Watch said it had "documented summary executions, torture, and rape committed by soldiers under Nkunda's command in Bukavu in 2004 and in Kisangani in 2002", where it said Nkunda's fighters summarily executed 160 people during an attempted mutiny.
Human Rights Watch said that in the latest violence in eastern Congo, "both rebel forces and Congolese army troops have raped and otherwise attacked civilians and looted their property."
- AP