DRC ex-rebels claim control of Bukavu

BUKAVU, DR Congo – The leader of a group of ex-rebels integrated into the Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) new army said yesterday his men had taken control of the eastern town of Bukavu, where fighting first broke out a week earlier.

“General Felix Budja Mabe is fleeing the town,” Jules Mutebusi, who has been suspended as an army colonel, told AFP, referring to the head of regular forces in the area. “I control the town of Bukavu,” he added, saying he was speaking from the town’s radio and television centre.Bukavu is the capital of Sud-Kivu province.Mutebusi’s claim could not be independently confirmed.”Mabe’s men attacked us again at 05h00, that is why we counter-attacked,” said Mutebusi.Bukavu itself had been calm from Friday until shooting broke out there early yesterday morning, although regular troops and about 1 000 men under the command of another former rebel, General Laurent Nkunda, have clashed with rival groups of rebels-turned-soldiers every day since Sunday near the airport serving the town, about 30 kilometres to the north.Between Wednesday and Friday, 39 people were killed in clashes inside Bukavu, according to the UN mission in DRC, MONUC.Another 20 were killed in the fighting near the airport.By Saturday, Mutebusi’s men seemed to have obeyed an order issued by MONUC on Friday evening, to retire with their weapons to five designated sites in the town.MONUC spokesman Sebastien Lapierre said Monday he could not confirm the fall of Bukavu but said Mutebusi’s men had left the five sites.MONUC has brought in hundreds of reinforcements to Bukavu since last week.Mutebusi and Nkunda were both senior figures in the Congolese Rally for Democracy, a Rwandan-backed rebel group that rose up against Kinshasa in 1998 and, with help of troops deployed by Kigali, ended up controlling much of eastern DRC during the civil war that ended last year.Both men claim to be defending the area’s Banyamulenge community, Congolese Tutsis who speak Rwanda’s language and whose relations with the rest of the local population have long been a source of tension and instability.Many see the Banyamulenge as more Rwandan that Congolese and Rwanda’s effective occupation of the region during the war was bitterly resented.- Nampa-AFP”I control the town of Bukavu,” he added, saying he was speaking from the town’s radio and television centre.Bukavu is the capital of Sud-Kivu province.Mutebusi’s claim could not be independently confirmed.”Mabe’s men attacked us again at 05h00, that is why we counter-attacked,” said Mutebusi.Bukavu itself had been calm from Friday until shooting broke out there early yesterday morning, although regular troops and about 1 000 men under the command of another former rebel, General Laurent Nkunda, have clashed with rival groups of rebels-turned-soldiers every day since Sunday near the airport serving the town, about 30 kilometres to the north.Between Wednesday and Friday, 39 people were killed in clashes inside Bukavu, according to the UN mission in DRC, MONUC.Another 20 were killed in the fighting near the airport.By Saturday, Mutebusi’s men seemed to have obeyed an order issued by MONUC on Friday evening, to retire with their weapons to five designated sites in the town.MONUC spokesman Sebastien Lapierre said Monday he could not confirm the fall of Bukavu but said Mutebusi’s men had left the five sites.MONUC has brought in hundreds of reinforcements to Bukavu since last week.Mutebusi and Nkunda were both senior figures in the Congolese Rally for Democracy, a Rwandan-backed rebel group that rose up against Kinshasa in 1998 and, with help of troops deployed by Kigali, ended up controlling much of eastern DRC during the civil war that ended last year.Both men claim to be defending the area’s Banyamulenge community, Congolese Tutsis who speak Rwanda’s language and whose relations with the rest of the local population have long been a source of tension and instability.Many see the Banyamulenge as more Rwandan that Congolese and Rwanda’s effective occupation of the region during the war was bitterly resented.- Nampa-AFP