Bukavu battle boosts crisis

2004-06-07 13:53

Bukavu - Renegade troops battled with government forces on the outskirts of this strategic city on Monday, exacerbating a crisis in eastern Congo which threatens the peace process that ended five years of war in Congo.

The fighting erupted after the government's regional military commander, Brigadier General Mbuza Mabe, attempted to return to Bukavu, said Colonel Jules Mutebutsi, one of two renegade leaders who seized the city last week.

Mutebutsi's troops fought with government forces about two kilometres outside Bukavu in a bid to prevent Mabe's advance.

The crisis in eastern Congo has posed the biggest threat yet to the cohesiveness of Congo's power-sharing government.

Mutebutsi and a second renegade commander - Brigadier General Laurent Nkunda -seized Bukavu on Wednesday, forcing Mabe and his troops to flee.

Nkunda pulled out of the city on Sunday, saying he had accomplished his objective. But Mutebutsi and his forces remained quartered in camps in Bukavu, an important trading centre on the border with Rwanda.

UN troops have taken over security in the city to protect civilians, but have not intervened to stem the fighting between the armed factions.

We pushed them back

The government soldiers "came down the hills ... and were heading to our position while others were marching on the city centre," Mutebutsi told reporters. "We fought them and pushed them back, but they are still coming to attack."

On Sunday, Nkunda warned that his troops would return to Bukavu if Mabe attempted to retake the city.

The crisis has further strained already poor relations between Congo and Rwanda, with the government in Kinshasa, Congo's capital, accusing its neighbour of backing the uprising.

Rwanda has strongly denied the accusation. On Sunday, it closed its border with Congo to all but refugees of any fighting, and said the frontier would remain closed pending an international probe of Congo's charges.

Congolese residents have also blamed the 10 800-strong UN mission in Congo for failing to prevent the fall of Bukavu.

Violent demonstrations targeting UN staff and installations broke out in cities across the country on Thursday.

Fired into a crowd

UN forces at one point fired directly into a crowd of rioters that had overrun its logistics base in Kinshasa. The fusillade killed three rioters.

Thursday's and Friday's violence in the capital, the worst since 1997, killed at least 12 people and injured 88 others. No UN staff were reported to have been harmed.

During the weekend, Rwandan insurgents abducted about 60 Congolese civilians in the Ruzizi Plains, south of Bukavu, said Sebastien Lapierre, the UN spokesperson in Bukavu.

"This is a result of the fact the ... (Congolese army) had to deal with Nkunda instead of protecting civilians," Lapierre said.

- SAPA