African Briefs

Kabila says Rwanda is aiding rebels KINSHASA – DRC President Joseph Kabila has openly accused neighbouring Rwanda of being present in the volatile east of the country where rebels are fighting government forces.

“As for Rwanda’s presence, that is an open secret,” Kabila said on state television late Saturday, calling for a buffer force between the warring sides as he agreed with his Rwandan counterpart Paul Kagame earlier this month.
The force would neutralise militias in the resource-rich region and patrol the DR Congo-Rwanda border, Kagame said then.
Rwanda has persistently denied reports that it is backing the rebel M23 movement, formed in the DR Congo’s eastern Nord-Kivu province in April.
But a report by the UN Group of Experts published in late June said M23 has been receiving direct aid from top Rwandan officials, including weapons, ammunition and recruits.

Ousted leader denounces expulsion
ANTANANARIVO – Madagascar’s ousted leader, Marc Ravalomanana on Saturday denounced the expulsion of his wife hours after she had returned home as proof that his rival was not serious about peace efforts.
The former president and his wife have repeatedly tried and failed to enter the country after he was toppled in 2009. Lalao Ravalomanana returned to the island on Friday but was forced by authorities to go on to Thailand.
“Once again the regime in Madagascar has proven that it cannot be trusted,” Ravalomanana said of his rival Andry Rajoelina, the current ruler who took power with army backing three years ago.
The two held talks last week.

Second conviction in Mandela plot
PRETORIA – A South African court on Friday convicted a second man of high treason in a white supremacist plot to kill Nelson Mandela and drive blacks out of the country in a trial that has spanned nearly a decade.
One day after ‘Boeremag’ kingpin Mike du Toit was convicted of high treason, his brother, former policeman Andre du Toit, received the same verdict in a Pretoria court.
High Court Judge, Eben Jordaan, said there was no doubt that Andre du Toit had been part of the inner circle of the Boeremag organisation, which had planned a right-wing coup in 2002 to overthrow the post-apartheid government.
Known as the Boeremag – Afrikaans for ‘Boer Force’, a reference to the descendants of the first Dutch colonisers – the men are said to be behind nine bomb blasts that shook the Johannesburg township of Soweto in October 2002.

Ebola breaks out in Uganda
KAMPALA – The deadly Ebola virus has killed 14 people in western Uganda this month, Ugandan health officials said on Saturday, ending weeks of speculation about the cause of a strange disease that had many people fleeing their homes.
The officials and a World Health Organisation representative told a news conference in Kampala Saturday that there is “an outbreak of Ebola” in Uganda.
“Laboratory investigations done at the Uganda Virus Research Institute ... have confirmed that the strange disease reported in Kibaale is indeed Ebola hemorrhagic fever,” the Ugandan government and WHO said in joint statement.

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