1997Forced Flight

AZG/DRC02/opmaak engels 12-11-2002 17:06 Pagina 36 1997 FORCED FLIGHT: BRUTAL 1997STRATEGY OF ELIMINATION Following the outbreak of the Kabila led rebellion and the attack of the refugee camps at the end of 1996, an esti- mated 900,000 Rwandan and Burundian refugees had gone back to their country. However, more than 340,000 remained in Zaire, hiding in the hills and the forests of the Kivu or fleeing northwest, ahead of the advancing frontline8. Makeshift camps were set up in Shabunda and around Kisangani. The refugees who reached the Kisangani region in late March and early April were in an appalling condition. Diarrhoea, malnutrition, malaria, as well as severe foot and leg injuries were widespread. From early 1997 the ADFL attacked and emptied those new camps, reportedly killing thousands of people. Large numbers fled into the forest and thousands attempted to return to Rwanda on foot. Many times since October 1996, ADFL forces had prevented relief organisations from bringing humanitarian aid to the refugees. In other instances, they had clearly used humanitarian aid as a bait to force the refugees out of the forests – and elimi- nate them more easily. To MSF it appeared that Kabila troops were deliberately following a policy of extermina- tion of the refugees, including women and children. According to an MSF estimation, at the end of May 1997, some 190,000 refugees had still not been localised, scattered in the forest and largely inaccessible to humanitarian organisations. Mobutu was overthrown by Kabila’s forces on the 17th of May, 1997; Zaire then became the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). 8 See maps of the refugee movements on page 65 36 MSF © Kadir van Lohuizenn AZG/DRC02/opmaak engels 12-11-2002 17:06 Pagina 38 THE MASSACRE OF RWANDAN REFUGEES Nurse? Guard? Guard? At that time I was working in Biaro refugee camp, 42 One night at around two o’clock in the morning, we Before ADFL forces entered Shabunda area, a massive km. away from Kisangani. In the camp, there were at found out that Lola camp was surrounded with ADFL group of Rwandan refugees arrived in the village least ten deaths per day; the people were living in mis- forces; at four thirty they entered the camp. Some of where I was living, 50 km. north of Shabunda town. erable conditions, it was cold, there was almost noth- the refugees were so scared of being caught, that they They settled in a football field; the population of the ing to eat, and the NGOs didn’t spend the night there, plunged into the latrines; others managed to flee to the village and a missionary Father were assisting them. because of the insecurity. The Tutsis were surrounding forest. The humanitarian staff was held by the military Little by little, we were hearing that Kabila’s troops the camp. One day, they dropped bombs on the camp; – they took our walkie-talkies. Then the military were moving forward. One morning, several weeks everybody fled, leaving everything behind and scatter- gathered together the refugees they had caught and after the refugees’ arrival, we heard that the troops ing in the equatorial forest – there were many dead. escorted them to Kisangani airport. The people were were only 30 km. away from our village; a lot of refugees The AFDL put the cadavers into mass graves and sitting on the ground, on the tarmac; the men on one left the camp, fleeing towards Shabunda, but some of burnt them. side and the women on the other side. The humani- them stayed in the village, hiding in the houses together tarian staff was not allowed to talk to the people. If with the local population. I myself was hiding two they saw you talking to refugees, they would give you a children whose parents had fled to Shabunda – I was THE (FORCED) REPATRIATION OF RWANDAN REFUGEES beating. Then the refugees were put into single file and hiding them in my house in the forest, where we have Nurse? herded onto the plane to Rwanda. our fields. Then Kabila’s forces arrived; they started to From Biaro refugee camp, 42 km away from Kisangani, look for refugees in all the houses and in the houses in we would bring the refugees all the way to Kisangani the forest – mostly at night. A lot of people were killed. airport for their repatriation – first by UNHCR truck, Three days later, the military left towards Shabunda, then by ferry across the Congo River, and by truck I myself was hiding two children whose parents where there was a big refugee camp. We heard from again to the airport. The refugees who were scattered had fled to Shabunda – I was hiding them in my our brothers there, that a terrible massacre took place in the bush were also called out of the forest; they were on the Ulindi bridge. told that the situation was calm in Rwanda, that there house in the forest were trucks waiting for them, and they were directly Logistician? brought to the airport. There, the Antonov planes were In 1997, some 50.000 Rwandan refugees were located waiting for the refugees; the plane would open from in a huge camp 7 km north of Shabunda. When Kabila the back, we would lay plastic sheeting inside, disinfect forces entered the area, they started to empty the camp the refugees’ feet before they got in, give them two to flee westwards, towards Kindu; but the camp was on blankets, a box of energy biscuits, plus a bucket if ever the other side of the Ulindi river, and the bridge they had to vomit. Then we would take off to Rwanda. between the camp and the road had been blocked. The I cannot say that this repatriation was voluntary, refugees were driven back, then massacred by the mili- because the refugees didn’t really know the situation in tary. When I took to the road to the north two weeks Rwanda – when we would land in Kigali and they later, it was strewn with dead bodies. would see that there were only Tutsis on the ground, they were surprised and shocked. Infact, I think these This episode lasted approximately three months; as people were in danger in Rwanda; some of them were and when the military caught the refugees, they gath- directly put in jail. One day the expatriate who was ered them together, put them in single file and drove with us wanted to accompany the refugees to the camp them down to the river. Then they would stab them to where they were supposed to be brought, but the death and throw them into the river. Some of the dead Rwandan Army refused – they even slapped him in bodies floating on the river still had their babies on front of my eyes. They surely didn’t want him to see Kadir van Lohuizen © their back. the reality. 38 MSF DRC 39 AZG/DRC02/opmaak engels 12-11-2002 17:06 Pagina 40 1998“AFRICA’S FIRST WORLD WAR” After the takeover of power by Kabila in 1997 political tensions in the area soon became evident. In particular, Kabila’s failure to control the Hutu militias and the “ex- Forces Armées Rwandaises” (FAR) soldiers, who were still perpetrating violence and massacres in the east and threatening the borders of Rwanda, was strongly criti- cized by Rwanda. In July Kabila ordered the Rwandan troops to leave the country, triggering a rebel insurrec- tion which started on August 2 from the east. The “Rassemblement Congolais pour la Démocratie” (RCD), backed by Rwanda and Uganda, soon occupied a large part of DRC. The rebels’ attempt to overthrow the govern- ment in Kinshasa failed only when Angola, Zimbabwe and Namibia sent troops into Congo to assist Kabila. Heavy fighting occurred in many parts of the country leading to displacement. The situation was so unstable that aid organisations were often unable to reach the victims. In the beginning of 1998 a cholera outbreak in a military camp near Kisangani revealed that some 3000 children were being detained in overcrowded and “dangerously unsanitary”9 conditions in Kapalata training camp. Although the epidemic had already been raging for months, killing hundreds of children, the military authorities guarding the camp consistently blocked the efforts of humanitarian agencies and the local health authorities to access and assist the children. At the end of January 1998, of the 767 patients who had been transferred to the MSF cholera treatment centre, more than 16% had died. 9 Source: UNICEF DRC, 1998 40 MSF © Kadir van Lohuizenn AZG/DRC02/opmaak engels 12-11-2002 17:06 Pagina 42 CHOLERA OUTBREAK IN KAPALATA TRAINING CAMP typhus, cholera, etc… I don’t know what happened to people. They told us that in a village half-way the Mai because the nurses there ask money for the consult- Nurse? the children who finally recovered. Mai were fighting against the RCD. With us, in the ation, and I haven’t got any. At that time I was working with MSF in Kisangani; the vehicle, there was a twenty year old Tutsi soldier – he Now we still live in fear and insecurity. When the Congo River had overflown, and we were preparing a was carrying grenades, but he had taken his uniform Rwandan military and the Interahamwe arrive in possible cholera outbreak. Meanwhile, we heard that THE SECOND WAR BREAKS OUT off in order not to be caught. When we arrived in that our village, they take people forcibly to carry their soldiers were dying in a military camp in town; the Guard? village, the Mai Mai stopped us; nobody betrayed the things, and then these people disappear.

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