U N I T E D N A T I O N S Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Integrated Regional Information Network for Central and Eastern Africa Tel: +254 2 622147 Fax: +254 2 622129 email: irin@ocha.unon.orgCentral and Eastern Africa IRIN-CEA Weekly Round-up 23 3 - 9 June 2000
CONTENTS: DRC: Humanitarian disaster looming in Kisangani DRC: Fierce fighting in South Kivu DRC: Masire postpones inter-Congolese talks BURUNDI: Buyoya, Mandela agree on key conditions BURUNDI: FDD dismissive of Buyoya-Mandela accord TANZANIA: UNHCR unaware of 45,000 seeking repatriation RWANDA: Tribunal orders release of internal UN memo ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: Victory statements and accusations continue ERITREA: Displaced from Assab arriving by sea in Massawa ERITREA: Refugees arriving in Sudan caught up in clashes ERITREA: Ethiopians held in security camps HORN OF AFRICA: UN appeals for $378 million for drought victims SUDAN: Sudan sends first export of oil SOMALIA: Investigation into murder of aid worker in Somaliland SOMALIA: Djibouti peace conference must decide "old or new" delegates DRC: Humanitarian disaster looming in Kisangani The humanitarian situation in the northern Congolese town of Kisangani is worsening day by day following the fighting between Ugandan and Rwandan forces. hundreds of people reported dead and others wounded according to news agencies and humanitarian sources. "Following an estimated 2,000 bomb shells falling on the town we expect more deaths than what is being reported," the head of MSF in Goma told IRIN on Friday. "At the moment nobody knows the actual number of causalities due to the continued fighting as MSF and ICRC staff remain indoors." Fierce fighting continued in the town on Friday, despite Presidents Paul Kagame of Rwanda and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda reaching agreement on ceasefire on Thursday, following a telephone conversation with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. [Please see IRIN-CEA daily bulletins for detailed reporting on the Kisangani fighting.] DRC: Fierce fighting in South Kivu Fierce fighting has been reported in parts of South Kivu between Mayi-Mayi militia and the rebel Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie (RCD-Goma). According to the BBC Kinyarwanda service, the fighting is in two areas - the Hauts Plateaux area near Uvira, and the Kalehe area north of Bukavu. In Kalehe last week, 60 civilians were killed in an attack by the Mayi-Mayi and Interahamwe against the villages of Nyabibwe and Numbi, the BBC said. It added that RCD fighters killed 20 of the attacking forces. The radio quoted South Kivu deputy governor Benjamin Serukiza as saying that in the Uvira region, the RCD launched a third attack against a Mayi-Mayi stronghold in the Rugeje mountains on Tuesday. Six civilians and 25 Mayi-Mayi have reportedly been killed, with 20 militiamen captured. DRC: Masire postpones inter-Congolese talks The facilitator of the inter-Congolese dialogue, Ketumile Masire, on Wednesday postponed the preparatory talks which were being held in Cotonou, Benin "until such a time as full representation could be reached". Masire regretted that the DRC government "not only chose not to send a delegation to the Cotonou meeting, but also prevented other participants from leaving Kinshasa, confiscating their passports and tickets", a statement from his office said. Masire's office told IRIN that a tentative date for another round of preparatory talks had been set for 3-7 July in Gaborone, Botswana. BURUNDI: Buyoya, Mandela agree on key conditions Agreement has been reached on two key conditions for ending the civil war in Burundi, the South African Broadcasting Corporation reported on Wednesday. Mediator and former South African President Nelson Mandela made the announcement in Johannesburg on Wednesday after meeting Burundian President Pierre Buyoya. He said they had agreed that Burundi's Tutsi-dominated army would be restructured to include an equal representation of the country's Hutu majority. In addition, all Hutus in regroupment camps are to be allowed home by the end of next month. Mandela said the agreements cleared the way for the first face-to-face talks between Buyoya and Hutu rebel leaders at regional peace talks, scheduled in Tanzania next month. BURUNDI: FDD dismissive of Buyoya-Mandela accord Following the agreement between President Pierre Buyoya and mediator Nelson Mandela to divide the army 50-50 between Tutsis and Hutus, rebel CNDD-FDD leader Jean-Bosco Ndayikengurukiye reacted by saying it was not a question of figures. He told the BBC Kirundi service he had never discussed figures with the mediator. "You are the first to tell me about the percents," he told the interviewer. "Our main concern is not figures. Our main concern is to find a solution to the cause of the war in Burundi. The most important issue is to study how the Burundi army will always respect the view of the people." TANZANIA: UNHCR unaware of 45,000 seeking repatriation UNHCR Kigoma on Wednesday said it was not aware that some 45,000 Burundi refugees had reportedly registered for repatriation. An official in Kigoma, Marion Roche, told IRIN that a few weeks ago, some refugees approached UNHCR officers in Karago camp saying that 80 of them wanted to be repatriated. "The number later increased to 400," she noted. "Our officers in Kibondo asked the refugees to go and make a list of all those who wanted to be repatriated but by last Friday, there was still no list presented." The private Burundi news agency Net Press on Tuesday reported that more than 45,000 Burundi refugees had registered for repatriation. RWANDA: Tribunal orders release of internal UN memo The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) on Thursday ordered the release of a document written by a former UN employee concerning the circumstances surrounding the 6 April 1994 plane crash in which the former president of Rwanda Juvenal Habyarimana and his Burndian counterpart Cyprien Ntaryamira were killed. An ICTR statement said that the three-page internal memorandum was written in 1997 by Michael Hourigan, a former member of one of the investigative teams of the office of the prosecutor for the Tribunal. It said that Hourigan wrote the memo "on his own initiative", while on a short-term contract with the Office of Internal Oversight Services at the UN headquarters in New York. The memo was found in a file at the headquarters earlier this year and transmitted to the Tribunal, whose president then placed the document under seal. ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: Victory statements and accusations continue Ethiopia and Eritrea traded accusations of fighting as talks continued in Algeria. Eritrea accused Ethiopia of launching attacks on the Assab front, the latest on Thursday. Fighting was still continuing on Friday morning, Eritrean radio reported. A statement by the Eritrean foreign ministry called the fighting at Assab "a flagrant violation of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) agreement" as Eritrea had withdrawn two weeks ago according to the requirements of the peace plan. Eritrea also claimed a "major defeat" of Ethiopian troops in Tesseney in western Eritrea, on Monday, and said "most of the western towns that were occupied in the early days of Ethiopia's invasion" had been liberated, including Barentu, Haikota, Tesseney, Guluj and Tokombia. The Ethiopian government said Eritrea had "incited hostilities" at the Assab/Bure front and that there had been intense fighting during Tuesday night, but that Ethiopia had "thrashed" Eritrean troops. ERITREA: Displaced from Assab arriving by sea in Massawa A new wave of displaced people from the recent fighting on the eastern Bure front, near the Red Sea port of Assab, has been arriving by sea in the port of Massawa. WFP spokesperson Lindsey Davies, who visited Massawa on Monday, told IRIN that about 4,000 people had arrived by boat in the port. About 1,000 of these had been absorbed by the local community; the remainder were at a local school, sleeping in classroom and corridors or under tarpaulins. Davies said the numbers of displaced people in Eritrea could not be accurately verified, because the situation was "very fluid" and people were still on the move. Many people were hiding in hills and mountains, where aid agencies had no access; an estimated 50,000 were gathered in pockets south of Tesseney, along the Sudanese border. These displaced were in the path of withdrawing Ethiopian troops and consequently extremely vulnerable, said humanitarian sources. The UN was working on a planning figure of 750,000 displaced people. ERITREA: Refugees arriving in Sudan caught up in clashes The renewed fighting between Ethiopian and Eritrean forces in western Eritrea led to a fresh wave of refugees crossing the border into Sudan on Monday. A UNHCR spokesman told IRIN that at least 3,000 had crossed by the end of the day, with more expected overnight. The new arrivals in Sudan included at least two wounded civilians, the first recorded by UNHCR since the fighting began on 12 May, indicating that the refugees had been caught up in the actual fighting, rather than fleeing ahead of it. The spokesman said gunfire and shelling was clearly audible on the Sudanese side of the border throughout the day. ERITREA: Ethiopians held in security camps Eritrean officials acknowledged some 7,500 Ethiopians were being held in four camps, in Massawa, Dekemhare, Mendefera and Keren, citing "security breaches" and "protective custody" as reasons for their internment. The Shiteki camp was opened on 29 May after Ethiopia bombed the international airport on the first day of peace talks in Algeria. Ethiopians are now being officially invited to sign up to return to Ethiopia, which may be preparations for repatriation, according to diplomats. An international journalist who visited Shiteki camp, 23 km south of Asmara, said the mostly male population of the camp was being held "under light guard in good conditions". Journalists said Ethiopians in the camp felt they had "some degree of choice" as to whether they remained there. HORN OF AFRICA: UN appeals for $378 million for drought victims The UN on Wednesday launched an emergency appeal for US $378 million to avert the effects of drought in Ethiopia, Kenya, Eritrea, Somalia and Djibouti. The appeal aims to address the immediate needs of 13.4 million people, following three consecutive years of poor rains and the total failure of rains last April throughout the Horn of Africa. In a forward to the appeal, WFP Executive Director Catherine Bertini, the UN Special Envoy for the Drought in the Greater Horn of Africa, said that for many of these people, timely assistance was the difference between survival and death. SUDAN: Sudan sends first export of oil Sudan exported its first shipment of oil products, sending some 20,000 mt of gasoline to Malta on a Turkish tanker that left Port Sudan on the Red Sea on Monday, reported the official newspaper Al-Anbaa. Energy and Mining Minister Awad el-Jazz was quoted saying that the government planned to expand its gasoline export to some 600,000 mt annually. A 1,610 km pipeline carries crude oil from southern oil fields to the Red Sea and is constantly threatened by rebel activity. Meanwhile, the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) said in a statement that an upsurge of fighting has forced the Sudan government to stop work at six key oil wells in the southwest of the country. Government army spokesman Mohamed Osman Yassin denied the SPLA had launched attacks in the area and told reporters that there was "no presence of the rebel forces that jeopardizes the petroleum operations in those areas". SOMALIA: Investigation into murder of aid worker in Somaliland The Somalia Aid Coordination Body (SACB) expressed its "deepest regret" over the death of project manager Dieter Krasemann of German Technical Cooperation (GTZ) in Somaliland on Tuesday. SACB comprises donors, UN agencies and NGOs working in Somalia, and works in concert regarding security issues - particularly kidnappings and killings of aid workers - in Somalia. GTZ and the German embassy requested that the Executive Committee meet on Wednesday to discuss the incident, which was the first killing of a foreign aid worker in Somaliland. A statement released by the SACB said Krasemann was stabbed while sitting in his car in Burao, and died almost instantly. His assailant was immediately arrested and an investigation was underway by the Somaliland authorities. SOMALIA: Djibouti peace conference must decide "old or new" delegates The Somali peace conference held in Djibouti is coming to the end of its consultative phase, after composition of the predominantly clan delegations was slowed down by disagreement, diplomatic sources told IRIN on Friday. Debate focused particularly on numbers regarding sub-clans, women and minorities. The final composition of the delegations is likely to be four groups of 160 representatives, with smaller groups representing minorities. There are "hundreds of former politicians" at the conference, the source told IRIN. "It will be interesting to see which delegates are chosen; old or new." 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: 07/12/00 EDT