Rebels warn: Don't disarm us
2005-02-02 13:07
Nairobi - A Rwandan Hutu rebel group accused of a prominent role in the country's 1994 genocide warned the African Union on Wednesday that it would forcefully resist plans to disarm its members in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
The Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) said it was prepared for dialogue but was "shocked" by the disarmament plan and told the African Union to prepare for "the consequences of this barbaric act."
"Those who prefer disarmament to dialogue should be ready for the consequences of this barbaric act," FDLR spokesperson Anastase Munyandekwe said in a statement.
"The FDLR warns those who are planning this forceful disarmament (that its) members are not ready to be massacred like in 1997 in the jungles of the then-Zaire," he said.
Munyandekwe maintained that the Rwandan army had then murdered more than 200 000 Rwandan refugees in what is now the DRC with the support of the international community.
AU to send troops
Wednesday's stern warning was issued after African Union leaders at a summit earlier this week in Abuja endorsed a plan to send peacekeepers to the eastern DRC in a bid to quell escalating regional tensions.
The force is to be tasked with disarming mainly ethnic Hutu rebels who fled to the region from neighbouring Rwanda after taking part in the genocide in which at least 800 000 people, mainly Tutsis, were slaughtered.
Munyandekwe, however, rejected the assumption that the FDLR had been involved in massacres and said the group was "profoundly shocked" by moves "to forcefully disarm its members who are falsely accused of genocide."
The presence of the rebels in the eastern DRC has caused major instability in the African Great Lakes region with Kigali accusing Kinshasa and the United Nations force in the country of failing to control the insurgents.
Rwanda has threatened to send troops into the eastern DRC to crack down on the rebels while DRC officials have accused Kigali of using the FDLR's presence as a pretext to make incursions in the vast central African nation.