{UAH} M7 calls CRISIS Meeting as Rwanda-Congo War roves

Heads of State from The International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) which includes Angola, Burundi, Central African Republic, Republic of Congo, DRC, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania and Zambia are expected to attend.

A Congolese government tank prepares to deploy for fighting against M23 rebels, at an operating base in Kanyaruchinya, north of Goma, eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Rwanda Defence Forces (RDF) has been deploying armoured tanks and piling heavily-armed soldiers along its border with DRC in preparation for combat.

Rwanda leader Paul Kagame and DRC President Joseph Kabila are more than likely to attend the crisis meeting at the Commenwealth Resort in Munyonyo.

Meanwhile it's not known whether Tanzania President Kikwete who reached out to President Museveni to help mediate in its simmering row with Rwanda will attend.

Rwandan officials met their DRC counterparts three weeks ago at a meeting of regional leaders in the Kenyan capital Nairobi.

Kigali's rumblings with Kinshasa took a new high when a mother in Rubavu District of Rwanda was killed by Thursday's bombing from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Vestine Mukagasana, 44 was buried in Karundo Cemetery in Gisenyi Sector after a requiem mass at Mbugangari Chapel.

The Rwandan army on Thursday accused her neighbours of "deliberately" firing a rocket over the border.

Following Thursday's incident, the Rwanda government warned that such "provocation can no longer be tolerated."

The Government blamed the attacks on the joint operations of Congolese army (FARDC) and the FDLR, a Congo-based militia group blamed for the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda.

Last Thursday alone, 10 rockets were fired in the border district of Rubavu from the Democratic Republic of Congo, with the first targeting a market.

The second bomb landed near the Grand Barriere – one of the two official border crossing points into DRC while the other landed in Busasamana village. Over 30 bombs reportedly landed in Rubavu last month.

 Kampala-Kinshasa ties also frosty

Just early this week, Brig Geoffrey Muheesi, formerly representing Uganda on the Joint Regional Intelligence Fusion Centre in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, was expelled by the Kinshasa government.

The expulsion spells fears that the relations between the two countries might deteriorate amidst panic and war threats between the DR Congo and Rwanda.

The army spokesperson, Lt Col Paddy Ankunda, said they do not know why Brig Muheesi was summarily expelled from Goma, a city in the eastern DRC, where he was one of the 11 military officers from members of the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR).

The ICGLR established the Intelligence centre last year to monitor the illegal activities of different rebel groups in eastern Congo.

 

A trailer carrying a tank leaves the Rwandan capital Kigali en route to the border town of Gisenyi, August 30, 2013.

MONUSCO Plans To Set Up Security Zone

The spokesman for the United Nations Stabilization Mission to the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUSCO), says the group intends to set up a security zone to prevent the M23 rebels from launching long-range attacks on North Kivu's capital, Goma. The city has a population of over one million.

"MONUSCO has decided to put in place a security zone. The main objective of the security zone is to prohibit the M23 from reaching with its weapons the densely populated capital, of Goma, and this way to protect the population," said MONUSCO spokesman Madnodje Mounoubai.

"This is one of our main objectives of our mandate."

He says Martin Kobler, the U.N. special representative who heads MONUSCO, issued instructions to the troops to use any means necessary to protect civilians after the M23 launched missiles into the population.

"This means we have to dislodge M23 from [their positions] where its long range artillery can still reach the town of Goma," said Mounoubai.

"The FARDC [Congo's national army] has launched an operation to dislodge the M23 from their [base] on the hill, and in accordance to the instruction and order from the special representative, our force of course joined in that operation."

The conflict between the combined forces of the FARDC and the UN peacekeeping troops on one side and the rebels on the other began on August 21 in North Kivu province.

Mounoubai accused the M23 rebels of indiscriminately shooting rockets into Goma as well as MONUSCO's base. He says an officer from Tanzania was killed and eight other peacekeepers injured as a result of the shelling.

The rebels denied the accusation saying, both the FARDC and the UN peacekeepers are to blame for the shelling.

"For the M23 to be saying the MONUCO force or the FARDC is behind the new fighting I think is just not correct," said Mounoubai.

"As far as we are concerned, our main objective so far is to push M23 to a position where their long-range artillery can no longer reach the town of Goma."

He says officials of the Congolese government are looking at several options.

"As far as we are concerned, we don't look at the military perspective as the only solution. President [Joseph] Kabila said that he is looking at all options: diplomatic, political and military," said Mounoubai. "There is talk between the government of the DRC and M23 in Kampala."

Mounoubai says the U.N. peacekeepers will continue to work closely with the FARD to prevent civilian casualties from the rebel shelling.

"We stand by and support any military operation that the national army, the FARDC will take.

This is our commitment and we have this mandate, we will do everything in our disposal to make sure that there is security for the population of Goma," said Mounoubai.

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The only way of limiting the usurpation of power by
 individuals, the military or otherwise, is to put the people in charge  - Capt. Thomas. Sankara {RIP} '1949-1987

 *"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent

revolution inevitable"**…  *J.F Kennedy

 

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