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CENTRAL AND EASTERN AFRICA
IRIN-CEA Weekly Round-up 198
25 - 31 October 2003


CONTENTS:

CENTRAL AFRICA: Regional peace force set up
DRC: NGOs ask UN to address corporate dimension of country's conflict
DRC: UN panel releases report on plunder of resources
DRC: MONUC denounces obstruction of verification missions in east
DRC: Norway gives US $15.7 million in humanitarian aid
DRC: UN Food agency, Kinshasa sign accord for nine projects
DRC-UGANDA: UN official praises Kampala, Kinshasa ties
DRC-UGANDA: Displaced in western Uganda struggle with refugee influx
DRC-UGANDA: Museveni welcomes former dictator's son
UGANDA: Gov't commits to buying generic anti-retrovirals
CAR: Bozize lifts seven-month-old curfew
BURUNDI: Parliament approves power-sharing deal
BURUNDI: Four suspects arrested for death of WHO official
BURUNDI: Opposition leader Charles Mukasi released
TANZANIA: Sharp increase in crop prices threatens food security, agency warns
TANZANIA: EU gives €114 million for poverty reduction
Rwanda: Torrential rains leave 7,000 homeless

ALSO SEE:

DRC: IRIN interview with Eugene Serufuli, governor of North Kivu Province
at: http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37454

DRC: IRIN interview with Michel Kassa, outgoing head of UN OCHA at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37505

KENYA: Feature - Making communities safe from small arms at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37520

CENTRAL AFRICA: Regional peace force set up

Regional military chiefs from the Economic Community of Central African
States meeting in the Republic of Congo (ROC) decided on Wednesday to
create a brigade-size peacekeeping force for intervention in zones of
instability.

"We have not yet decided the actual troop strength and the amount of
equipment for the force," Maj Gen Charles Mondjo, the chief of staff of
the ROC armed forces, said.

Troops and their equipment will be drawn from military units of all the
community countries: Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic,
Chad, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Republic of the Congo, and Gabon.
Mondjo said the brigade would include members of the gendarmerie and civil
protection units.

The meeting on Wednesday, held in the ROC capital, Brazzaville,
recommended that military planners form each of the ECCAS states form a
group to work out the details for the force. They also suggested the
establishment of a joint peacekeeping training centre and military
exercises every two years, the first of which is to take place in Chad.

African military chiefs of staff meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, decided
in May to create standby subregional peacekeeping forces until the issue
of a continental force is taken up by the African Union.

DRC: NGOs ask UN to address corporate dimension of country's conflict

A coalition of NGOs called on the UN Security Council on Monday to insist
that member states launch immediate investigations into the involvement of
multinational corporations accused of profiteering from war in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

The International Rescue Committee said recent years of war in the DRC had
caused the deaths of at least three million people, the largest loss of
civilian life since World War II.

"The Security Council can no longer ignore clear evidence linking the
exploitation of resources to the war in the Congo," the NGOs said in a
statement. "It must insist that member states hold the companies and
individuals involved to account, including companies based in western
countries. Business must demonstrate its commitment to change the way it
operates in conflict situations." [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37479]

DRC: UN panel releases report on plunder of resources

The UN Panel of Experts on the Illegal Exploitation of Natural Resources
and other forms of Wealth of the DRC released its final report on Tuesday,
listing names of individuals, companies and governments involved in the
plunder of gems and minerals, and recommending measures to be taken to
curb the exploitation.

The report listed five categories of companies according to the level of
cooperation they gave the panel, and the status of their cases, ranging
from those whose cases had been resolved to those which did not respond to
the panel's inquiries.

As the panel released the report, the Ugandan government challenged it to
produce evidence that the country was involved in fuelling instability in
the DRC as a cover-up for economic plunder. The government-owned Ugandan
newspaper, The New Vision, on Wednesday quoted Foreign Minister James
Wapakhabulo as saying that Uganda was in the DRC for a mission, which it
accomplished and had since withdrawn. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37519]

DRC: MONUC denounces obstruction of verification missions in east

The UN Mission in the DRC, known as MONUC, has denounced what is says is
the obstruction of its efforts to verify allegations of the presence of
Rwandan government forces in eastern DRC.

The declaration comes amid widespread media reports that significant
numbers of Rwandan troops have been seen entering the DRC. Rwanda has said
repeatedly it has had no soldiers in the DRC since October.

On Tuesday, MONUC said that for several weeks, its military observers had
been refused access to military camps in North Kivu Province run by the
Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie (RCD-Goma) former rebel group,
now party to the DRC's transitional government. And in camps to which it
was granted access, MONUC said that military officers of the RCD, which in
the past was openly supported by neighbouring Rwanda, denied MONUC
observers permission to speak with soldiers who were present.

"MONUC denounces the obstruction of its verification missions and believes
that such measures risk leading to the conclusion that the information
that has been received [regarding the presence of Rwandan troops on
Congolese soil] is not without foundation," MONUC said. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37517]

Earlier, on Monday, the Rwandan foreign ministry said the recent report by
human rights advocacy group Amnesty International that Rwanda still had
troops in the DRC was "based on unfounded allegations, speculation and
innuendo".

It said: "We categorically reject insinuations by Amnesty International,
some NGOs and journalists that we still have forces in the South and North
Kivu [provinces] and even in Ituri region. It is wrong and simply aimed at
tarnishing the image of Rwanda." [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37477

DRC: Norway gives US $15.7 million in humanitarian aid

Norway has given the DRC 40 million kroner (US $15.7 million) for
emergency relief measures, State Secretary Vidar Helgesen announced on
Thursday.

He said the latest aid was part of the Norwegian foreign ministry's
allocation towards new emergency relief measures in the Great Lakes
region, which had brought to 130 million kroner the total humanitarian aid
it had given the region since the beginning of the year.

The aid, being channelled through the Norwegian Refugee Council, the
Norwegian Red Cross and Norwegian Church Aid, is used to support schooling
for children, women rape victims, demobilisation and reintegration of
child soldiers and to help with tracing separated family members.

An estimated three million people have died as a consequence of the
fighting in the DRC since 1998, with 3.5 million others displaced, "and
there are regular reports of murder, ill-treatment and rape of civilians",
Norway said. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37428]

DRC: UN Food agency, Kinshasa sign accord for nine projects

The UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and the Democratic
Republic of the Congo signed an agreement on 24 October for nine projects
that will cost US $4.3 million.

>From its technical cooperation fund, FAO will pay for two projects, one
of which will be the rehabilitation of irrigation networks in the regions
of Pool Malebo, and the provinces of Kinshasa as well as Bas Congo. The
second FAO-funded project will be for the improvement of local and
national capacities to develop rural schools.

Seven other urgent FAO agricultural projects for the country will be paid
for with contributions from Belgium, Italy, Japan and Switzerland.

[Full story in French at:
http://www.irinnews.org/FrenchReport.asp?ReportID=5078]

DRC-UGANDA: UN official praises Kampala, Kinshasa ties

The Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for the Great Lakes
Region, Ibrahima Fall, congratulated the governments of the DRC and Uganda
on Wednesday on re-establishing diplomatic relations.

The move lent more credence to the Declaration of Principles on
Good-Neighbourly Relations and Cooperation adopted in September by the
governments of Burundi, the DRC, Rwanda and Uganda in New York, Fall said
in a statement.

The two countries issued a statement on Tuesday in the Ugandan capital,
Kampala, committing themselves to resuming full diplomatic ties and
establishing direct air links. Ugandan Foreign Minister James Wapakhabulo
and Congolese Regional Cooperation Minister Mbusa Nyamwisi, who was
visiting Kampala, issued the statement. "We shall not allow rebel groups
to use our territories to wage war," The New Vision quoted Wapakhabulo as
saying. [Full story at: http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37527]

DRC-UGANDA: Displaced in western Uganda struggle with refugee influx

Displaced people in western Uganda's Bundibugyo District are struggling to
cope with the arrival since March of some 11,000 refugees from the
war-torn Ituri District of neighbouring DRC, according to a report by the
Kampala-based Refugee Law Project (RLP).

The sheer size of the refugee population relative to local people was
creating a crisis in the area, the organization said. In Ntoroko (with a
population of 4,000) 8,000 refugees had arrived, putting tremendous
pressure on scarce resources.

In the second half of the 1990s, a rebellion by the Allied Democratic
Forces (ADF) devastated Bundibugyo District. Led by Sheikh Jamil Mukulu,
the ADF said it wanted to redress the balance of power in Uganda's
government, which, it said, marginalised Muslims. The rebel group swept
through the west of the country attacking villages and trading centres,
killing and abducting hundreds of civilians on its way.

Fear of attack drove thousands of civilians in the region out of their
homes, displacing an estimated 70,000 people by 1998. By 2000, that figure
had risen to 175,000, according to the RLP.  [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37521]

DRC-UGANDA: Museveni welcomes former dictator's son

Taban Amin, a son of the former Ugandan military ruler, Idi Amin, was
received warmly by Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni on Tuesday at his
official residence in central Kampala, according to the presidential press
office. Amin returned to Uganda on Monday after years of self-imposed
exile in the DRC, where he is alleged to have occupied the derelict
Ugandan embassy, closed after Uganda cut diplomatic relations with the DRC
in 1998.

DRC President Joseph Kabila, the son of Laurent-Desire Kabila, his
predecessor, deported Amin after receiving complaints from Ugandan
officials who argued that the transitional government in Kinshasa should
no longer protect Ugandan rebels.

Amin had reportedly been worrying Ugandan officials following reports that
forces loyal to him, which were at one time allied with Kabila senior's
armed forces against Rwandan- and Ugandan-backed rebels in eastern DRC,
were regrouping in the Semliki Valley along the border between the DRC and
Uganda. [Full story at: http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37530]

UGANDA: Gov't commits to buying generic anti-retrovirals

The Ugandan Ministry of Health made its first clear commitment on 26
October to buying cheap generic copies of anti-retroviral (ARV) drugs.

"We have a law in place that allows us to import generic drugs in a
crisis, and we will certainly be doing this," Jim Muhwezi, the minister of
health, told IRIN at the 11th conference of the Global Network for People
Living with HIV/AIDS, held in Kampala.

The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria had already given
Uganda about US $52 million specifically for "comprehensive treatment of
HIV/AIDS", and was expected to give it another $36 million, he said.

The revelation came after UNAIDS announced at the conference that
high-quality generic drugs approved by the World Health Organisation (WHO)
were about to become cheaper. UNAIDS Chief Executive Officer Ben Plumley
told delegates that the Clinton Foundation had recently come to a deal
with generic manufacturers to halve the prices it had previously paid for
ARVs. [Full story at: http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37478]

CAR: Bozize lifts seven-month-old curfew

The Central African Republic (CAR) leader, Francois Bozize, has lifted a
curfew that has been in force since 15 March, when he seized power from
President Ange-Felix Patasse, state-owned Radio Centrafrique reported.

The midnight to 5 a.m. curfew was lifted on 24 October, days after Bozize
received delegations of business people in the capital, Bangui. Delegates
had told him that their activities had been seriously hampered by the
curfew, as it had prevented supplies of basic commodities from reaching
rural areas.

The lifting of the curfew occurred as the National Transitional Council
was reported to be examining bills outlawing the possession of arms and
looting of public and private property. Many public and private buildings
were looted and vandalised after Bozize's coup. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37498]

BURUNDI: Parliament approves power-sharing deal

Burundi's parliament has approved the power-sharing agreement signed on 8
October between the transitional government and the country's largest
rebel group, the Conseil national pour la defense de la democratie-Forces
de defense de la democratie led by Pierre Nkurunziza, according to the
Burundian news agency, ABP. The agency said the transitional National
Assembly approved on Wednesday all the agreement's provisions and pledged
to contribute to its implementation.

The parliamentary approval gives President Domitien Ndayizeye the
authority to implement in its entirety the agreement signed in Pretoria,
subject to the provisions of the Arusha accord of the year 2000 and the
transitional constitution, ABP reported. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37426]

BURUNDI: Four suspects arrested for death of WHO official

Burundi police arrested four more people on 24 October suspected of
killing of the World Health Organisation (WHO) representative in the
country, Dr Kassi Manlan.

The suspects are the deputy administrator of the immigration police,
Gerard Ntunzwenayo; an official at the government intelligence services,
Jaffet Nahimana; the commander of the national police, Emile Manisha; and
the commander of the traffic police, Sylvestre Manirakiza. They were taken
immediately to the public prosecutor for questioning.

Manlan, an Ivorian doctor, was killed on 19 November 2001. Fishermen found
his body on the northeastern shores of Lake Tanganyika the following day
close to a restaurant in Bujumbura, the capital. He had left home the day
he was killed for a morning jog. Immediately after his body was
discovered, six persons were arrested, among them his assistant, Gertrude
Nyamoya, and his house and office guards. Nyamoya was released Wednesday.

BURUNDI: Opposition leader Charles Mukasi released

Burundian politician Charles Mukasi, leader of an extremist faction of the
main pro-Tutsi Union pour le progres national, has been released, Radio
Burundi reported on 24 October.

Presidential police officers arrested Mukasi on 17 October in connection
with his opposition to the current transitional government in the country.
Mukasi's faction is opposed to the accord for peace and reconciliation,
signed in 2000 by 19 Burundian parties in Arusha, Tanzania.

He was arrested a day after he was placed under house arrest. Before his
arrest, he had said that he had received a warrant from the Presidential
Police, accusing him of "sedition and refusal to appear before the court".

Mukasi's lawyer, Gabriel Sinarinzi, and a human rights organisation, Ligue
Sonera, had termed the arrest illegal and denounced as inhumane the
conditions under which Mukasi was being held. Mukasi has been arrested
several times in connection with his opposition to the transitional
government.

TANZANIA: Sharp increase in crop prices threatens food security, agency
warns

The Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET), a USAID-funded
activity, has warned that access to food by poor households in Tanzania's
rural and urban areas is becoming increasingly difficult because of high
crop prices, particularly that of maize, the country's staple.

"FEWS NET recommends that government urgently release the remaining
tonnage of its plan from the Strategic Grain Reserve to protect the poor
from falling into hardship and recourse to extreme (self-damaging) coping
mechanism, such as selling productive assets," the agency said in its
monthly food security report issued on Thursday.

It urged the donor community to respond to an appeal in August by the
government by pledging and delivering food aid. "If the donor
contributions are delayed further, the affected poor farmers will leave
home in search of jobs or income generating opportunities to the detriment
of tending their fields," FEWS NET said. Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37496; the FEWS NET report is
available online at: www.fews.net]

TANZANIA: EU gives €114 million for poverty reduction

Tanzania is among five countries scheduled to receive EC funding to help
eradicate poverty, the EC announced on 24 October. In a statement, the EC
said it would provide €114 million (€1 = US $1.17) for Tanzania, €90
million for Niger, €90 million for Madagascar, €50 million for Chad and
€21 million for Namibia.

"As a Millennium Development Goal, combating poverty in developing
countries is one of the EU's top priorities," Poul Nielson, the
commissioner for EC's Development and Humanitarian Aid, was quoted as
saying.

He added, "These five programmes will help to improve the lives of
millions of people across Africa, delivering long-term, structured support
implemented in collaborative partnership with governments and NGOs." [Full
story at: http://www.irinnews.org/print.asp?ReportID=37474]

Rwanda: Torrential rains leave 7,000 homeless

Torrential rains in the northern province on Byumba and the northeastern
province of Umutara in Rwanda have left at least 7,000 people, or 1,000
families, homeless, the Rwanda News Agency (RNA) reported on Thursday.

The agency reported that residents of the two provinces had urged the
government to rescue them. It quoted sources from Umutara as saying that
the homes of at least 700 families had collapsed and the roofs of others
blown away by gusting winds. In Rukara District alone, 113 homes were
damaged, cows and goats died, and crops were destroyed, RNA reported.


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Copyright (c) UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 2003


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