{UAH} PRESIDENT KAGAME IT IS TIME YOU TALK TO YOUR FUTURE LEADERS

Congo groups urge Rwanda dialogue with Hutu rebelsBy JUAKALI KAMBALE | Sunday, December 8 2013 at 11:53

Combination of file picture shows Rwanda President Paul Kagame and in Kigali and Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete in Addis Ababa on May 26, 2013. Relations between Tanzania and neighbour Rwanda became strained after Kikwete advised Rwanda, Uganda and DR Congo to open negotiations with rebel forces. But in response, Kigali angrily suggested Kikwete was speaking for the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a Rwandan Hutu rebel group based in DR Congo. FILE

Congolese civil society groups are urging the Rwandan government to reconsider its stance on holding talks with the Hutu militia it blames for sponsoring the 1994 genocide horror.

Mr Roger Itegeka, a spokesman for the FDRL, (Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda), last week told UN observers that the militia were willing to disarm but on condition that Kigali holds a sincere and frank political dialogue with them on a number of issues.

The statement is seemingly a reaction to UN threats against various armed groups operating in North Kivu province, the hotspot of eastern Congo violence.

Martin Kobler, the UN secretary-general's representative in DRC recently declared on UN radio that after the M23 rebel movement was defeated, all remaining armed groups would be hunted down and eradicated.

M23 was routed by a combination of Congolese army and a UN "offensive" force, the first such in peacekeeping operations.

As expected, the Rwanda government, which refuses to countenance any such talks, immediately reacted negatively.

"No dialogue with the authors of the genocide," a spokesman of the government in Kigali declared.

About four different armed groups operate in North Kivu, namely the FDRL and SOKI, FOCA and RUDE.

The current Rwandan militias are visibly too young and are thought to be the children of those who really participated in the 1994 genocide.

Their call for political dialogue with the Rwandan government has however been supported by Congolese Civil Society Organizations based in the North Kivu province.

Caused row

Omar Kavota, the CSO’s spokesman, said only dialogue such as that ongoing between the DRC government and the M23 can resolve the security issues facing the Rwandan regime.

"I do not personally understand why the international community forces the DRC government to necessarily hold peace talks with the M23 rebel movement [but] seems to support the Rwandan government position when it categorically refuses to negotiate with the FDLR only because the FDLR membership supposedly participated in the 1994 genocide”, he said.

The issue was at the centre of a major row between Rwanda and Tanzania after President Jakaya Kikwete urged the governments of Rwanda and Uganda to negotiate with their respective rebel movements operating in DRC.

The FDLR appears to be the next target of the UN offensive brigade. The rebels have been urged to disarm and surrender calmly before the UN forces them to do so.

Some two drones have already been deployed in the North Kivu province in order to control the displacement of armed groups all over the province and especially at the common border between DRC and Rwanda.

The UN maintains about 22,000 peacekeepers in its mission in Congo.

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