NUMBER 145 • ISSUE 1 • 2007

Huge Country, Huge Problems —Huge Potential Can DR Congo Turn the Page? THE EDITOR’S DESK Fulfilling the potential

t is a huge country with immense problems. the rape of tens of thousands of women and girls? – it is Potentially one of the richest countries in Africa, but nevertheless, in a way, misleading. currently one of the poorest. A country full of tragic Much of DRC has not been actively involved in conflict – Iparadoxes. including some parts of the east. Hundreds of thousands of Its inhabitants are for the most part energetic and creative. internally displaced people and refugees have returned They are people who enjoy a good debate, have a great sense home, and are reintegrating successfully. Repatriations of of humour and love music – and they are brilliant at getting Congolese refugees are currently, or will shortly, be taking by on very little. place from six countries to DRC – and refugees from four of Meet the people of the Democratic Republic of Congo. DRC’s neighbours have also been benefitting from repatria- The majority: those who would just like to get on with liv- tion operations in the opposite direction. ing, and who came out in their millions to vote in the recent But all Congolese, even those who live thousands of kilo- elections. The people who are fed up with fighting, with cor- metres from the conflict zones, have been affected one way or ruption, with warlords, with foreign invasions. The people another by the troubles: through interrupted food and med- who just want to see ical supplies, decayed or their country back on destroyed infrastructure its feet. and lack of investment. And then there is the And DRC’s nine small minority: the peo- neighbours have been ple fostered by the ty- affected too: through di-

phoon of violence and ©AP / A.SUNDARAM DRC•2006 minished trade, popula- anarchy that swept tion movements, and across the east of the above all through shared country between 1996 insecurity – with the and 2003 – and which conflicts in Uganda, continues sporadically Rwanda and Burundi to this day. The people fuelling and then who have grown accus- becoming lethally tomed to killing and to intertwined with those taking what they want, in DRC. and destroying what they don’t want. The people who have A peaceful, functioning DRC could – should – be an raped, pillaged, turned at least 30,000 children into soldiers, economic turbo-charger for the other countries in the region. and caused millions to flee their homes. The country possesses an incredible array of mineral wealth, In the immediate aftermath of a successful referendum on and could generate enough electricity to light up the whole of the country’s constitution in 2005, and tense but in the end Africa. But from the time of the Belgian King Leopold II, via equally successful presidential elections concluded in three decades of kleptocracy under President Mobutu, to November 2006, there is some hope that the latter group today’s collection of local warlords and foreign exploiters, may – finally – be on the wane. DRC’s wealth has so far brought it little except war, It is virtually impossible to give a properly balanced corruption, and – ironically – intense poverty. picture of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is just The recent advances on the political front are important too big. DRC has been generally neglected by foreign media milestones in the development of the nation, achieved with – especially outside the Francophone countries. What news immense effort and the help of over 17,000 UN peacekeepers. there has been, has inevitably focused mainly on the fighting But they represent only the first steps on the path to stability and atrocities taking place in the east. and prosperity that so many Congolese desire and deserve. Yet, even if the scale of these horrors makes such coverage The rest of the journey promises to be equally hard – and will unavoidable – how can you ignore massacres, mutilation and take much longer.

2 REFUGEES Editor N°145 • 2007 Rupert Colville French Editor Cécile Pouilly Contributors Cyprien Fabre, David Nthengwe, 4 COVER STORY Georges Charrière, Jens Hesemann, Michel Kassa, Philippe Maughan, Recent elections led to cautious hopes Sandra Candolfi, Simon Lubuku and unhcr for a better future in DR Congo – after a staff worldwide. decade of violence and anarchy on a scale Editorial Assistant Manuela Raffoni that defies the imagination. UNHCR/R. CHALASANI/ZRE•1997 Photo Department Suzy Hopper, Anne Kellner It is vast, and should be ONE AMONG THOUSANDS rich, but war, chaos and 15 Design 4corruption have taken a A Congolese rape victim, now Vincent Winter Associés, Paris huge toll on DR Congo. living as a refugee in Kenya, describes Production Françoise Jaccoud her ordeal as the captive of a marauding Distribution militia group. John O’Connor, Frédéric Tissot Photo Engraving Aloha Scan, Geneva 16 SHEER BRUTALITY Maps Experts fear that an HIV epidemic may unhcr Mapping Unit compound the suffering of some of the Historical documents tens of thousands of women raped in unhcr archives eastern DRC. REFUGEES is published by the Media Relations and Public Information Service of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The Women have suffered immensely at the THE CONGOLESE opinions expressed by contributors are not hands of rampaging necessarily those of unhcr. The designations 15 18 IN SOUTH AFRICA groups in eastern DRC. and maps used do not imply the expression With DRC still facing an uncertain of any opinion or recognition on the part of unhcr concerning the legal status of a future, the flow of Congolese refugees territory or of its authorities. and migrants to South Africa shows

REFUGEES reserves the right to edit all articles little sign of stopping. before publication. Articles and photos not covered by copyright © may be reprinted without prior permission. Please credit unhcr and the 20 LEBANON DIARIES photographer. Requests for copyrighted photos should be directed to the agency credited. Seven UNHCR staff who worked in English and French editions printed in Italy Lebanon, Syria and Israel give a vivid by amilcare pizzi S.p.A., Milan. account of their experiences as last Circulation: 114,000 in English, French, UNHCR/A.BRANTHWAITE/LBN•2006 MONUC summer’s war unfolded around them. Italian and Spanish. Over a million people were ISSN 0252-791 X 20displaced by the Cover Clockwise from top left: short but devastatingly Congolese woman heading home. destructive war in Lebanon. UNHCR / J. OSE / ROC•2005 Voter in Bunia, Ituri. ©REUTERS / J. AKENA / DRC•2006 Lendu militiaman. ©AP / K.PRINSLOO / DRC•2003 Rainforest background. UNHCR / C. BOWERS / DRC•1997

Back cover Rwandan refugees in Goma. UNHCR / A. HOLLMANN / ZRE•1994

UNHCR P.O. Box 2500 1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland www.unhcr.org

REFUGEES 3 Huge Country, Huge Prob

Once known as “one of the most magical and cut-off places in the world,” the Ituri Forest, in north-east DRC, has in recent years witnessed some of the country’s worst atrocities.

4 REFUGEES lems — Huge Potential Can DR Congo turn the page?

BY C ÉCILE P OUILLY one of the richest countries in Africa. The Congo River – the country’s legendary back- irst impressions of the Democratic bone – is capable of generating immense quantities Republic of the Congo are often seductive. of hydroelectric power, its output of 40,000 cubic Visitors arriving in Kinshasa are confronted metres of water per second making it the second with an intoxicating blend of colour, noise, most powerful river in the world after the Amazon. Fsmells and movement. Against a background DRC also possesses the largest rainforest in of Congolese rumba and animated discussions, an ex- Africa; and a staggering array of subterranean traordinary range of market stalls decorates every wealth that includes between 50 and 80 percent of street corner: peanuts, smoked meats, ginger juice the entire global reserves of cobalt, niobium and and brooms are bought, sold and haggled over with coltan (a rare metal used in the manufacture of good humour and a certain panache. portable telephones and game consoles), as well as More than 80 percent of the economic activity is dozens of other valuable minerals including located in this lively informal sector, generated by diamonds, uranium, gold, silver and oil. legions of struggling but tenacious street sellers, Despite all this intrinsic wealth, DRC is currently bicycle traders and shoe-shine boys. And it is not just one of the poorest countries in the world – ranked 167 Kinshasa, tucked down in the bottom left corner out of 177 countries in the 2006 Human Develop- of the country, which functions in this way: “In ment Index. Eighty percent of the population live on the large cities, every street is turned into an open less than a dollar a day; and more than half do not air market. That's all the people have to live on,” have access to health care or drinking water. explains Zacharie Kasongo, head of the research The statistics are numbing: over 12,000 reported network Réseau Grands Lacs. rapes in eastern DRC alone in the six months up to But this vivacious street life cannot mask the sad October 2006; as many as 3.4 million internally dis- reality of a country where the problems are as gigantic placed people (IDPs) at the peak in 2003; around 4 as the terrain (the total land area is bigger than France, million deaths attributed directly or indirectly to Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK combined). the 1998-2003 war; and one in five children dead

The Democratic Republic of the Congo should be before the age of five. AURORA / J. AZEL DRC•1988

REFUGEES 5 DRC is bigger than France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK combined

THE MOBUTU YEARS imperative: namely the need to eliminate the threat The two wars that spanned the period from posed to its borders by the Rwandan Hutu militias 1996-2003 speeded up the process of decay that had that had fled the country after carrying out the begun under President Mobutu Sese Seko, who ghastly 1994 Rwandan genocide, during which more seized power in 1965, five years after the then Repub- than 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered. As an army headed by the future Rwandan President Paul Kagame fought its way down from Uganda, capturing the Rwandan capital Ki- gali in July 1994, over 1.2 million Rwandan Hutus crossed the Congolese border, settling in huge refugee camps around Goma and Bukavu in eastern Zaïre (as the DRC was still known at the time). In addition to hun- dreds of thousands of or- dinary citizens – thou- sands of whom died of cholera during the first few days – the camps also © M. BLEASDALE / DRC•2004 contained perpetrators With different lic of Congo achieved independence from Belgium. of the genocide: the Interhamwe and members of the mines – like this In 1971 – “the year of the three Zeds” – Mobutu decid- former Rwandan armed forces (FAR). Repeated pleas open-cast gold ed to rename the country, the river and the currency, from UNHCR and others for effective international mine – controlled by different armed using the word Zaïre. He also nationalized the action to remove them from the camps fell on deaf groups (and even biggest companies – a move that accelerated the dis- ears. “The consequences were disastrous,” said the different states), integration of the economy, as the corrosive social Director of UNHCR’s Africa Bureau, Marjon Ka- DRC’s immense and financial effects of corruption at the highest mara, “for many of the refugees and for the DRC, mineral wealth fuelled the government levels eventually permeated all levels which has been paying a heavy price ever since.” devastating cycle of society. In September 1996, following a succession of of war and violence. After more than 30 years in power, President cross-border attacks by the re-formed Interhamwe Mobutu was finally toppled in 1997 during the First and their allies, the Rwandan army launched a series Congo War, by Laurent-Désiré Kabila, the son of a of heavy artillery attacks against the camps in DRC, postman from Katanga. The charismatic Kabila had as well as sending in ground forces. already been an established opponent of Mobutu In the ensuing chaos, involving the Congolese three decades earlier when Ché Guevara paid a army and rebel forces as well as the Rwandan mili- 1965 visit to the Republic of Congo to help foster a tary, some 600,000 refugees returned to Rwanda, revolutionary movement. while hundreds of thousands of others – including both refugees and former Interhamwe – retreated THE RWANDAN EFFECT into the jungles or fled further westward to escape. Much of the impetus behind Kabila’s final Many died of hunger and disease or in a series of successful campaign against Mobutu was provided massacres, which continued well into the following by Rwanda and Uganda. year. The precise numbers remain contentious to For Rwanda, the war was driven by a security this day.

6 REFUGEES CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC SUDAN ORIENTALE EQUATEUR

Congo River Ituri Bunia

Kisangani UGANDA REP. OF THE NORTH KIVU CONGO DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO Goma RWANDA Bukavu BANDUNDU KASAÏ SOUTH INTERNALLY DISPLACED ORIENTAL KIVU BURUNDI PEOPLE (BY PROVINCE) Uvira Kinshasa MANIEMA North Kivu 541,000 BAS- UNITED REPUBLIC CONGO Orientale 210,000 KASAÏ OF TANZANIA South Kivu 222,000 OCCIDENTAL Katanga 102,000 Equateur 100,000 Kasaï Occidental & Oriental 40,000 KATANGA Kinshasa 40,000 Maniema 8,000 ZAMBIA ANGOLA Other under 6,000

Source: OCHA, Oct.Source: 2006 Total 1,269,000

UNHCR / SATELLITE IMAGEMAP © 1996-2004 PLANETARY VISIONS

Meanwhile, DRC’s political landscape was radi- cally altered as Kabila, boosted by his rebel force’s victories in the east, ousted Mobutu in May 1997. However, after a short period of relative calm, he in turn faced rebellion in the east.

DESCENT INTO ANARCHY By August 1998, when the Second Congo War broke out, President Kabila’s relations with his for- mer allies had broken down as he tried to assert his independence. This conflict – also referred to as the “African World War” in that it involved seven other African countries – resulted in the division of DRC into a © S. SALGADO / ZRE•1994 government-controlled zone in the west and a rebel zone in the north and east, held by fluctuating coali- Local resistance movements against the “in- Some of the 1.2 tions of various different factions, including the vaders” began to emerge and multiply. The best million Rwandan refugees who Movement for the Liberation of the Congo led by known is probably the Mai Mai from the diamond- poured into eastern Jean-Pierre Bemba (the losing candidate in the 2006 rich Katanga Province. At first, according to DRC after the presidential election). Zacharie Kasongo, despite their strange rituals, they Rwandan genocide During the Second Congo War, the DRC rapidly were “well received by the population, as people who in 1994. The degenerated into a battleground where various would defend an ideal.” But the movement very murderous Interhamwe who neighbouring countries attempted to play out their quickly went wildly off the rails. Other groups such fled alongside them own internal conflicts, and various local Congolese as the Hema and the Lendu in the north-east were helped trigger the political or tribal groups were quickly sucked into also engaged in repeated fighting and tit-for-tat destabilization of an ever accelerating kaleidoscope of violence. massacres and atrocities, of which the best known Rwanda’s huge western neighbour. The established Hutu and Tutsi Banyamulenge took place in the Bunia region of Ituri district in communities in particular – many of whom had 2002-2003, leading eventually to the first-ever lived in DRC for decades – found themselves at the operation by a joint EU military force. centre of an increasingly complex conflict, at least Meanwhile numerous different interests – occu- partly because of their historic links with Rwanda. pying foreign forces, local tribal groups and political

REFUGEES 7 Numerous different interests took advantage of the mayhem to secure for themselves some of DRC’s dazzling array of mineral resources.

factions, as well as international commercial opera- still displaced at the beginning of December 2006. tions – took advantage of the mayhem to secure for themselves some of DRC’s dazzling array of mineral PATTERNS OF DISPLACEMENT resources. The displacement scenarios are extremely In the end, all the armed groups operating in varied. For the most part, people move between five eastern DRC played their part, to varying degrees, in and eighty kilometres from their villages, and return the cycle of violent acts against civilians: mass home within 48 hours. Although the great majority executions, acts of torture, gang rapes, forced labour, of displaced Congolese remained inside the country, theft and abductions – to name just a few. Largely by the beginning of 1996, 431,000 refugees had left ignored by the outside world, a large swathe of DRC to find safety abroad. the country was sinking into an orgy of violence Some areas in the east had been virtually emptied and anarchy. of their inhabitants. The so-called “triangle of death” The capital Kinshasa, despite being some 2,500 in Katanga Province is one such example – left at the kilometres to the west, was not immune from the mercy of the infamous Mai Mai warlord Gideon, effects as food supplies from conflict-affected eastern who with his band of child soldiers surrendered his provinces began to dry up. Every available parcel of weapons to MONUC last May. land was turned into a vegetable garden – but this Meanwhile, at the turn of the century, around “economy of resistance,” as it has been called by Con- 300,000 Angolan, Burundian, Rwandan, Ugandan golese researcher Thierry and Sudanese refugees, who had fled their own coun- Mayamba Nlandu, has its tries in search of safety in the DRC, found them- CONGOLESE REFUGEES limits. selves caught up in the middle of this Congolese In July 1999, there was torment. AROUND THE WORLD a positive development Hilarie Mukamurara, a Rwandan who arrived in (as of 1 January 2006) when the Lusaka Peace the DRC with her family in 1994, recalled their years Country of Asylum Refugees Accord was signed, un- of wandering: “We were cut off in the forest, without der the aegis of the Or- a roof over our heads, and we suffered insecurity, AFRICA (Top 10) ganization of African cold and hunger,” she said. United Rep. of Tanzania 150,100 Unity. This in turn led to “For a number of years,” added her husband, Zambia 61,200 the creation of a joint Pierre, “the rebel groups in the DRC prevented us Congo 56,400 Commission involving from returning to Rwanda.” Then, in 2004, they Rwanda 41,400 the various belligerents, were kidnapped. After managing to escape, they Uganda 20,600 as well as the deploy- finally found their way to a UNHCR reception Burundi 20,400 ment of an armed UN centre, from where they were repatriated voluntarily Angola 13,500 force commonly known to Rwanda. South Africa 10,600 as MONUC. Zimbabwe 6,500 The Lusaka Accord GETTING BY did not, however, bring During the war, their economy in tatters, Central African Rep. 3,300 an end to population dis- most Congolese muddled their way through from ELSEWHERE (Top 5) placements. According one day to the next – a way of life that led to some in- France 8,500 to the United Nations triguing inventions: there’s kibabola, for example, United Kingdom* 6,500 coordinating agency, which is made from the ashes of banana peel and Germany 6,300 OCHA, more than 75 wood, mixed with palm oil, and is used as a substitute Canada* 5,100 percent of the families for detergent. Unable to acquire petrol, traders trav- United States* 2,400 living in the rural zones elled hundreds of kilometres through dangerous of eastern Congo have territory by bicycle, and the tsukudu – a robust hand- OTHER 18,200 suffered displacement at made, foot-powered scooter capable of transporting Total 431,000 least once during the over 100 kilos – became the king of the road. past five years and some According to Cyprien Fabre of the European * UNHCR estimates 1.2 million in all were Commission Humanitarian Office (ECHO), who

8 REFUGEES Six Years in the East

Denise Beutler is a smiling, energetic in the forest. I had some water, bread and her mind to leave again. She entered young woman who lives in Switzerland a bag of sugar with me. It saved us. At one Rwanda disguised as a peasant going to with her husband and her son. She point, I told them: ‘I am not going any the market, helped by people waiting arrived in the country in 2000, after further. I am not from this place, so I with her belongings on the other side of spending the previous six years of her life would rather die here. At least someone the border. From there she made her way in North Kivu Province will find my body and my mother will to Kenya and finally to a new life in in the eastern part of know that I am dead.’” Switzerland, where she received refugee DRC. When the situation calmed down, a status, settled down and got married. Born in Kinshasa, traumatized Denise rejoined her family in Despite her evident courage and she began her job as a Kinshasa. determination to move on, her six years customs officer in “I had images of dismembered bodies in the troubled east of DRC still come Goma in March 1994, in my mind: a head here, a leg over there. back to haunt her. “On the first of August just before the I was crying endlessly. I remem- genocide in Rwanda bered the clothes I was wearing, UNHCR / C. POUILLY CHE•2006 and the massive influx covered with blood.” Displaced Congolese a month after the first of Rwandese refugees into DRC that However, after giving birth to civil war broke out in 1996. Millions more have been displaced in the decade since then. followed. her son, she was obliged to return “It was as if the whole of Rwanda was to Goma by the end of 1997, to running away. People were packed avoid losing her job. Life picked together. Some died on the spot from up again, bit by bit. Then, on exhaustion. Goma became a living 2 August 1998, the Second Congo cemetery. I hosted three people at my War broke out, bringing a new place. Some Congolese took kids they wave of attacks and atrocities found by the road suckling the breasts of against civilians. What shocked their dead mothers. We were deeply Denise most was what was being moved. done to the women. “The water supply, health care, “Women were raped in front security – everything kept on of their kids, of their husbands. deteriorating. The cholera caused terrible It was dreadful. After the rape, losses. I was attacked in my little house some men took knives and placed by masked and armed people. The only them in their vaginas. Up until reason I am still alive today is that I let now, the world has looked away – them take everything they wanted.” but this is the reality. Their homes Two years later, in 1996, the rebel were destroyed. Many of these groups fighting against the Mobutu women were cast out… these regime seized several towns, including women have been mutilated, their Goma, before they moved on to capture womanhood destroyed. Some Kinshasa. will never be able to give birth “When the ADFL [the alliance run by again. These are human lives that UNHCR / R. CHALASANI ZRE•1996 Laurent-Désiré Kabila] arrived, I was have been destroyed.” visiting a colleague of mine in another In Goma, the tension continued to rise neighbourhood. We had just got out of with the arrival of more Rwandan forces. [Swiss National Day], I hid under my bed his place when we saw a crowd of people Denise, who also acted as the president when the fireworks started,” she said. “I running past… We started running too. of a local trade union branch, resented thought the war had begun again – I had There was shooting. I remember a woman the growing sense of humiliation felt by forgotten I was in Switzerland.” just in front of me – a bullet hit her right her compatriots and decided to resign. “I will never give up,” she says. “That’s in the head. I barely managed to avoid her “People advised me not to. I had also why I choose to talk openly about what as she fell. There was nothing I could do. written a piece in a local newspaper to happened. What I feel the most strongly Shells were being fired at civilians. It was denounce the illegal cross-border about is the need to help women who raining bullets. smuggling that was going on.” have been raped.” “Everybody panicked. We took refuge Feeling very exposed, Denise made up —Interview by Cécile Pouilly The hospital encountered during the entire crisis has been simply where getting physical access to people in need. “The hours Immaculate is and hours on motorbikes, or in dug-out canoes – the shown receiving treatment after sheer difficulty in getting access to certain areas – is being attacked unimaginable,” Fabre added. by Lendu militia This opening up of the territory, through con- had itself been structing, repairing or securing roads, was to become looted, and was without medical one of the top humanitarian priorities. One of the supplies. Even key events, however, was the momentous journey up her bandages the Congo River of the so-called “Peace Barge” in had to be June 2001. salvaged from the debris. After three years of suspended river navigation, this boat – provided by MONUC – travelled from Kinshasa to Kisangani, symbolically reuniting the deeply divided nation. News of the operation, which was broadcast na- tionwide by the UN’s Radio Okapi – the only station covering the entire country – was particularly signif- icant to the Congolese given the immensely impor- tant role the Congo River has always played in their culture, history and economy. Assistance operations for the displaced people have been centred on North and South Kivu and Katanga provinces, as well as in Ituri district (in Ori-

© M. BLEASDALE / DRC•2003 entale Province) – which at the height of the crisis ac- counted for one million uprooted people all by itself. was stationed in the Bukavu region until recently, Over the past year, the DRC has become one of the villagers sometimes went so far as “to create the eight countries where the new so-called “cluster false villages to attract the militia and the bandits, approach” – a concerted effort by the UN and other while they kept the bulk of their goods and livestock humanitarian organizations to improve the coordi- hidden elsewhere.” nation of aid for internally displaced people – is being “There were some very isolated zones beyond tried and tested. Under the cluster approach, agen- the reach of humanitarian assistance,” Fabre con- cies join forces in groups covering their specific areas tinued, “notably in the High Plateau region. I recall of expertise such as health, food, water, shelter, ed- the first time that I went up to Fizi, a small town in ucation, “early recovery” (in DRC led jointly by UN- the west. They had HCR and UNDP), and protection (led by UNHCR nothing. There were and MONUC). REFUGEES IN DRC people in very difficult (as of 1 January 2006) circumstances. It was PEACE AND ACCOUNTABILITY? appalling… I believe At the political level, the assassination of the hope that our visit Laurent-Désiré Kabila on 16 January 2001 marked Country of origin gave rise to was even another major turning point. more important to them After his son, Joseph Kabila, succeeded him as in- Angola 106,800 than the assistance. The terim President, the peace process began to pick up Rwanda 42,400 people were happy to steam again, and in December 2002 the Sun City Ac- Burundi 19,000 find themselves finally cord was signed, which finally brought an end to the Uganda 19,000 reconnected with the Second Congo War. Sudan 11,700 outside world.” Even though by mid-2003 all foreign troops had Congo 5,200 officially left the country, various armed factions Central African Rep. 100 OBSTACLES remained active – for example, the 2,000 men of Various 200 TO AID Laurent Nkunda who continued to carry on a reign After the lack of terror in North Kivu, Total 204,400 of security, the biggest Nkunda himself is the subject of an International problem the humanitar- Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant for alleged war ian community has crimes during the capture of Bukavu in June 2004.

10 REFUGEES AP / K. PRINSLOO DRC•2003

And the Court is also responsible for the arrest of a soldiers recently received 15-year prison sentences A ten-year-old notorious warlord from Ituri District, Thomas following the collective rape of 120 women and Hema boy chasing a woman out of her Lubanga, for war crimes and military enlistment of pillaging of the towns of Nsongo Mboyo and Bon- shop during the children – a development that sets an important gandanga in Equateur province in December 2004. battles and tit-for- precedent. But, according to one foreign diplomat who tat atrocities Accusations have also been levelled against the requested anonymity, the fundamental problem between the Hema national army (FARDC) – with some observers even remains unsolved: “After the integration of some and Lendu militias in Bunia in 2003. suggesting it has become the primary source of in- rebel forces into the army,” he said, “they were security for civilians. In October 2006, for example, sending the salaries from Kinshasa. But a great deal Human Rights Watch issued a report that accused evaporated before anything reached the pockets of the army of continuing to carry out abductions of the lower ranks. Since the military are not paid, civilians in Ituri for forced labour. they help themselves – after all, they have to eat. According to the Director of the Initiative for Whether it's the regular army, or rebels or militia, Collaborative Leadership and Cohesion of the State they are all the same: they get hungry, in the full in the DRC, Michel Noureddine Kassa, it is essential sense of the word. When they rob a house, they first that the “culture of impunity” be terminated at all head for the kitchen.” levels of the political and military spectrum. “For trust and cohesion to be restored, it will require a TWO-WAY TRAFFIC visible change starting from the top leadership,” he Nevertheless, the lull in hostilities since said. June 2003 has allowed the return of a large number In another encouraging development, twelve of displaced people and refugees. Over the past three

Apart from security, the biggest problem has been simply reaching people.

REFUGEES 11 years, hundreds of thou- ing the communities to which refugees are return- RETURNEES TO DRC sands of IDPs have re- ing. These include efforts to help find peaceful solu- turned to their homes, tions to land disputes – an initiative stimulated by the 39,100 in addition to around assassination of several former displaced people in 85,000 refugees – mostly Ituri – as well as the renovation of schools and med- Total: 84,700 from Tanzania and ical facilities and the launching of income-generat- Congo-Brazzaville. ing projects, such as manioc mills, bakeries, carpen- Those who returned try and tailoring shops – all projects designed to 14,000 13,500 13,800 (the great majority to “benefit not only those who have returned to the Katanga, Orientale Pro - DRC, but the entire community” according to Seibou 1,100 3,200 vince and the Kivus) Insa, head of the UNHCR office in Equateur have sometimes been Province. 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 confronted with consid- But the movements are still by no means all in the erable difficulties, owing right direction. Military operations against rebel to the destruction of houses and absence of basic groups, and renewed direct attacks against civilians services. continued to cause new population movements In addition to helping in the actual repatriation of throughout 2006 – to the tune of 40,000 a month, ac- some 38,000 of the refugees, and providing assis- cording to the International Displacement Monitor- tance packages for returnees, UNHCR has estab- ing Centre. lished a number of programmes aimed at revitaliz- As a result, a number of humanitarian agencies

DRC is the size of Western Europe, has huge tracts of rainforest and hardly any roads – making aid delivery exceptionally difficult. © C. FABRE / DRC•2004

12 REFUGEES The Sun City Accord

and MONUC MONUC / C. BOULIERAC DRC•2006

Signed on 17 December 2002 in South forces led by Laurent Nkunda and Jules elections. Africa, the Sun City Accord was essentially Mutebusi in June 2004, and because of the Headed by William Swing, a former a power-sharing agreement which helped continuing precarious security situation in United States ambassador to the DRC unite the main opposing forces in a North and South Kivu, its troop strength during the Mobutu era, MONUC is the transitional government under a was increased significantly by the Security biggest and most expensive peacekeeping transitional constitution. It also provided Council in October 2004. operation in the world. It is also one of the for demilitarization, the withdrawal of Acting under Chapter VII of the UN most complex, involving not just foreign troops and the disarmament of the Charter, MONUC is authorized to use “all peacekeepers but also political, rule-of-law, militias, as well as the organization of free means deemed necessary, within the limits humanitarian, human rights and civil police and democratic elections. Under the of its capacities and in the areas of elements. However, its 17,600 soldiers, from Accord, some of the former rebel forces deployment of its armed units,” to 50 different countries, are spread over a were to be integrated into the Congolese discourage any forceful action that country that is two thirds the size of the army (known by its French acronym FARDC). threatens the political process and to European Union, and are – as the MONUC Established in November 1999 by the UN ensure the protection of civilians facing an website puts it – “severely challenged by Security Council, the Mission in the imminent physical threat. the operational and logistical difficulties of Democratic Republic of the Congo MONUC is also charged with facilitating deploying in a continent-sized country (MONUC) has a key role in the execution of the process of disarmament, without roads, where one-third of the both the Lusaka and Sun City Accords. demobilization, repatriation, resettlement budget is needed just to get in place to be Following the capture of Bukavu by rebel and reintegration, and with organizing able to start work.” were continuing to assist some of the 1.2 million peo- “The people are sick and tired of fighting – they The UN ple who were officially recorded as displaced as of want food on the table every day; they want their peacekeeping force (above) is the largest December 2006, an aid operation that is complicated children to go to school.” in the world, with by the fact that only a small proportion of them are The first round of the presidential election on 30 more than 17,000 living in camps. July 2006 and the run-off between the two leading soldiers. candidates – Joseph Kabila and Jean-Pierre Bemba – DEMOCRACY AND ELECTIONS on 29 October were a unique opportunity to “rehu- During 2006, there were signs that the Dem- manize millions of Congolese,” according to Michel ocratic Republic of the Congo was moving closer to Kassa. The election also brought an end to “ten years living up to its name. Indeed, given the state of the of humiliation of the Congolese people,” who were country in recent years, the progress up to and dur- energized by “a desire for freedom and human dig- ing the presidential elections was remarkable. In nity, from Ituri to Bas-Congo,” he added. December 2005, 85 percent of those who took part in As with so many things in the DRC, in order to a referendum on the new Constitution voted in come even close to succeeding, the election operation favour of it. The enthusiasm of the population to take had to match the scale of the country. During the ini- part in the vote was clear. In the words of Eusebe tial vote, 33 candidates were competing for the pres- Hounsokou, UNHCR’s Representative in Kinshasa: idency, and 8,000 for parliamentary seats. The choice

Given the circumstances, the progress up to and during the presidential elections was remarkable.

REFUGEES 13 After five years in exile, a returning refugee receives a warm welcome home from her relatives in Equateur Province. UNHCR / J. OSE DRC•2005

was to be made by up to 25 million voters in 52,000 On 15 November, Joseph Kabila’s victory in the polling stations, dispersed across a territory that ex- run-off with 58 percent of the vote was announced ceeds 2.3 million square kilometres. It was the largest by the electoral commission, amid widespread fears electoral operation in the entire history of the UN that the next vital step in the democratic process – and, irrespective of the political aftermath, it suc- acceptance of the election results – would be where ceeded – in spite of the immense logistical challenges it all fell apart. Such fears had been heightened in posed by the country’s non-existent infrastructure. August, even before the run-off took place, when at least 23 people were killed in Kinshasa during fighting between supporters of the two candidates. Concern mounted when the Supreme Court was set on fire on 21 November. However two days later, Carving Out A New Life with UN and EU troops patrolling the streets of Kin- shasa, and an intense international spotlight focused The province of South Kivu impression since his return across on what he would do next, Jean-Pierre Bemba began welcomed its 20,000th returning Lake Tanganyika. “I did not flee with withdrawing his militia from the capital. On 27 No- refugee in September 2006, and a skill,” he said. “But, in the refugee vember, shortly before this magazine went to press, many have already made an impact camp, a Congolese man called the Supreme Court confirmed the election results. on their home communities. A Survey taught me how to work Despite a comfortable margin of victory for returnee called Samora, for example, wood.” Thanks to a tool-kit provided Kabila, the country was split right down the middle has set up a successful business in by UNHCR, he has started a small geographically as well as politically: the western Kazimia village: “Before the war, carpentry business that enables him part, including Kinshasa, had voted overwhelmingly there was one milling machine here,” to feed his family and send his for Bemba, whereas the eastern half of the country he said. “After the war there was children to school. He’s even taking had voted overwhelmingly for Kabila. For this rea- none – until I returned.” Every on apprentices: a pair of son, Bemba’s pledge on 29 November that he would morning, a line of women queues up septuagenarians who had no other not oppose the Supreme Court’s final decision was outside his premises to grind their way of making a living. “They are greeted with relief and considered significant. maize and cassava into flour, and picking up the skill incredibly fast,” Such polarization nevertheless presents a clear set fewer local girls now have to spend he says. of dangers. Even if the country makes it through the hours laboriously pounding their “It’s encouraging,” adds UNHCR’s initial post-election phase relatively peacefully, the food with a pestle and mortar. Jens Hesemann in Kinshasa. long-term struggle for a stable democracy and A few kilometres away, in “Sustainable repatriation is built on greater prosperity will still be in its infancy. As Lubondja village, 46-year-old thousands of small successes like William Swing, the Special Representative of the Msambyo Choloko has also made an these.” UN Secretary-General, noted, “the worst thing would be if there was a good election but nothing changed.”

14 REFUGEES One Among THOUSANDS The story of a Congolese rape victim MONUC / C. BOULIERAC DRC•2005

BY M ILLICENT M UTULI Beatrice’s abductors were a group of As the group contined to plunder nearly 50 armed young men who lived villages on their way south towards ore than six years ago, Beatrice in shelters assembled from leaves, Uvira, they ran into another armed M.*, a schoolgirl at the time, was branches and plastic sheets. Their militia – possibly the Mai Mai. Fierce Mabducted by a band of armed captives were left outside, with only the fighting broke out, and Beatrice (who by militia from Karanga village, near eucalyptus trees for cover. now knew she was pregnant) and Elodie Goma in North Kivu – the epicentre of “We stayed in the open – exposed to seized their chance and escaped. Congo’s civil wars over the past decade. rain, flies, mosquitoes and other insects. Beatrice eventually found her way She was held captive along with five Even an animal is treated better than back to Goma where she was taken in other girls from Karanga and repeatedly the way they treated us,” she said. by an aunt who, along with the rest of raped by the Kiswahili and After nearly three months, Beatrice her family, had long believed she was Kinyarwanda-speaking fighters at their began to feel unwell. However, she dead. camp in the forested hills of Rutshuru. dared not tell anyone – least of all her After her daughter was born, Her five-year-old child, Pelagie, is abductors. Beatrice decided to return to Karanga – the daughter of one of the rapists. “If you said you were sick, you were against the wishes of her father, who “For one week, we were tied with flogged like an animal,” she said. feared for her life. ropes. The way you tie a goat,” Beatrice All her fellow captives, with the She had told her family what had explained in a mix of Kiswahili and exception of one girl called Elodie, died happened. She was emaciated, and she French. “You can still see the scars on – “maybe from the sickness, or from the knew people thought she had AIDs. my leg,” she added, pointing to welts on beating, or both.” Their bodies were Some kept their distance from her, but her shin. “They only untied us when then pushed into shallow graves dug by mostly they were sympathetic. You they wanted to satisfy themselves.” the surviving girls. could not afford to be scornful of a rape

REFUGEES 15 victim, when tomorrow it might be sixth birthday. She has started asking your turn, or that of your daughter or about her father, and Beatrice does not your mother. know how to answer. After all, the Karanga had continued to suffer father could be any one of the dozens of raids that tended to follow a predictable armed men for whom Beatrice was pattern: bouts of gunfire would precede cook, porter and cleaner by day, and sex the arrival of the fighters, then the slave at night. screams of panicking villagers, followed Throughout her interview, even by pandemonium as people ran for their while describing what was done to her lives into the surrounding hills. during her months in captivity, Beatrice As feared, soon after her return, the M. remained matter-of-fact, even rebels attacked again and, for the second somewhat detached. When she began to time in nearly four years, Beatrice fled talk about the father of her child, from a group of armed men – but this however, her eyes filled with tears. time with a baby strapped to her back. Beatrice is certain of two things: She remembers her mother’s warning: she is not going back to DRC yet; “Next time they will kill you, Bea. You and she will never tell Pelagie the have to go.” truth about her father. During Beatrice went first of all to Uganda, counselling, arranged for her by but quickly moved on after she spotted UNHCR, the possibility of having an one of her abductors at the main bus HIV test came up. station in the capital, Kampala. In “I have not gone for a test,” she said, September 2004, she reached Kenya, “because I’m scared of what the result where her sister lives. may be. But maybe I am not Early this year, Beatrice joined a seropositive, because Pelagie is healthy. tailoring school in one of Nairobi’s “If I can learn to be a good tailor, maybe suburbs and her daughter was enrolled I can live here,” she added softly.
in pre-school. * The names of Beatrice M., her daughter and her Pelagie will soon be celebrating her village have all been changed to protect her identity. Sheer BRUTALITY HIV may compound the suffering of the women raped in the eastern DRC

BY S ARAH R USSELL experts involved with the issue in tribal or political affiliations: once again Global Coalition on Women and AIDS eastern DRC believe the true number of – as in Bosnia and Darfur – rape has rape victims in the past ten years to be been used consciously, and with the ver the past decade, fighters from well over 100,000. Many, including utmost callousness, as a weapon of war. many different groups have Beatrice M. (see previous interview), The result: a petrified population, Oranged up and down the eastern have been kept as sex slaves for weeks or deserted villages and what will most provinces of the Democratic Republic of months on end. probably turn out to be a severe HIV the Congo slaughtering people, robbing The aim – at least in part – seemed to epidemic. and destroying property – and also be to use women as a means of helping “The conflict itself has made it raping tens of thousands of women and to damage or destroy entire virtually impossible to obtain reliable girls. That is the cautious figure. Several communities because of their ethnic, statistics,” said Paul De Lay, Director of

16 REFUGEES Survivor of a massacre: Many women from eastern Congo have suffered horrendous experiences at the hands of various local and foreign fighters. MONUC / Y. BOUZIANE BDI•2004 the UNAIDS Evaluation Division. can be attacked anywhere and at any Tanzania and Uganda, UNHCR has also Nevertheless, in 2002, Human Rights time of day or night: in the fields, at the been focusing on establishing Watch estimated that as many as 60 per market, on our way to collect water, in comprehensive HIV and AIDS cent of the armed men roaming the our houses…They are destroying us, programmes for refugees, returnees, countryside raping, torturing and body and soul.” internally displaced people and local mutilating women and girls could be Aware that they will never reach the communities in all six countries. HIV-positive, and noted that almost majority of the victims, UNHCR and And sensitization about HIV and none of the women had access to the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) have AIDS is also an integral part of the services and care. nevertheless been working together disarmament, demobilization and Now, however, medical workers are since early 2006 to provide survivors reintegration programme that began in beginning to get to areas that have been with treatment and counselling, by July 2004. The challenge is not just to long cut off by conflict. Their findings training health-workers how to deal raise awareness about AIDS among ex- are chilling. with rape. combattants, but to try to persuade The NGO Global Rights claimed Survivors are encouraged to come them to change their sexual behaviour. that just in the province of South Kivu, forward within 72 hours so they can Participants receive information some 42,000 women were treated in take a post-exposure prophylaxis against about the virus, and how it is health clinics for “serious sexual HIV and other sexually transmitted transmitted. They learn why fighters assaults” in 2005 alone. Doctors and infections. However, many women are a high-risk group. And they are women’s groups report that the assaults continue to conceal the fact that they offered voluntary testing and are notable not only for their scale, but have been raped because they fear social counselling services. But few volunteer also for their sheer brutality. ostracism. to be tested, stoking fears that large One survivor told another NGO, As part of a regional initiative on numbers of infected demobilized militia Human Rescue: “Sometimes the rapes AIDS, alongside the governments of will return to their communities and are so violent that the woman dies… We Burundi, DRC, Kenya, Rwanda, boost the epidemic even further.

REFUGEES 17 The Congolese refugees in

BY J ACK R EDDEN n an apartment in what was once a wealthy area of Johannesburg, Ia mother holding her baby explains that she left the Democratic Republic of Congo eight years ago to escape the brutal fighting between foreign-backed rebels and the government of Laurent- Désiré Kabila. On another street nearby, a recent Congolese graduate says he arrived in the last two months, driven out of the DRC because of the stance he took during the run up to the presidential election. The Congolese form the largest single group of refugees in South Africa: over 10,000 recognized refugees and a further 15,000 with asylum applications pending. As a result of continuing violence and political tensions in DRC itself, coupled with an illicit network of smugglers crossing the intervening countries, the flow of Congolese asylum seekers to South Africa shows no sign of stopping. “A cousin was living with us but she returned home two months ago,” said a Congolese woman, interviewed just before the final election results were announced, and who preferred to be identified by the pseudonym Gloria. saying they cannot afford the modest fees end up in South Africa, the economic “Now she has called to say she can’t stay that face both refugees and South powerhouse of the continent that is a because of the political tensions and is Africans: “It’s important for their future. magnet for both economic migrants and going to come back to South Africa.” It is painful to see them at home.” A 2003 asylum seekers. Congolese asylum Gloria is a mother of three daughters study showed that nearly half of seekers in South Africa describe how ranging from six years old to a few Congolese refugees had tertiary-level they paid to be loaded aboard a truck months, living with a husband who education, the highest rate among with other Congolese inside DRC, then works in IT, but earns the equivalent of refugees surveyed. In comparison, only were carried across Zambia and under US$200 a month. They live in five percent of South Africans had been Zimbabwe into South Africa. Some are what was once a desirable part of through tertiary education. delivered to specific addresses, such as a Johannesburg, but a long-abandoned Congolese refugees are found across church in Johannesburg where one swimming pool behind the building now the continent. In southern Africa, there woman says she was told to go by the holds only refuse and puddles of green are some 60,000 in Zambia – 40,000 in relative who paid for her trip. liquid. They split the $170 a month rent camps near the border with their former “Some people are just coming from of the one-bedroom apartment with homeland – as well as 13,000 in Angola DRC for work but it is very rare,” says three other refugee families. and 6,500 in Zimbabwe. Blaise Nzuzi, who works for the Jesuit She makes a special plea for assistance The part of DRC bordering Zambia is Refugee Services, one of UNHCR’s to get her eldest daughter into school, also the exit point for most of those who partners in South Africa. “Mostly now it

18 REFUGEES to camps, South Africa has never imposed such restrictions. But with the freedom the government has extended to refugees South Africa – giving them similar rights to citizens – comes the obligation to take care of yourself. UNHCR’s 2003 study found that, Close to half a despite their relatively advanced level of million refugees live outside DRC, education, those from DRC had the including these lowest household incomes of all refugee children across the groups – a median of only about US$70 a river in the Republic month. “Refugees are really in need of of Congo. More than 25,000 refugees and support, but here it is complicated,” says asylum seekers have Leon, a Congolese journalist who fled walked, driven or three years ago after receiving threats hitched thousands of because of a television programme in kilometres in search of a better – or safer which he appeared. “Here they are – life in South Africa. expected to be productive, to support themselves.” In an effort to continue his profession, he has learned English, in addition to the French spoken in DRC. Congolese, like other refugees in South Africa, tend to be young and often either single or separated from their spouse. They are scattered across the country but the biggest concentration is in Johannesburg, the commercial capital of South Africa. They also reflect the diversity of their vast homeland – including the ethnic and political rivalries. Feelings over the 2006 election ran sufficiently high for one humanitarian organization working with refugees in South Africa to suggest it might not be safe to organize a meeting that would include

UNHCR / J. HESEMANN ROC•2006 backers of the two rival candidates for president of DRC. is the political situation.” left behind were her three children: a son “I can’t talk about integration at this Esper, a nurse, said she fled DRC after of 17, and daughters of 16 and 12. Her stage, there are so many obstacles to soldiers confronted her outside a hospital husband is dead and a friend has taken in overcome,” says a graduate in in the east of the country because they the children, but she had not spoken to international relations who left the DRC suspected – correctly – that the staff were them since reaching South Africa five capital, Kinshasa, after the first stage of treating wounded Rwandans. “They months earlier. “I would love to go back this year’s two-stage national election would not hear of it when we said we to the children, to resume my job,” she because of threats from political rivals. must treat anyone who needs help. There said in a house full of Congolese refugees “But I can’t think of going home yet was shooting and I ran back into the in the Yeovil district of Johannesburg. either.” hospital to warn the patients to escape. “But my brother told me I cannot go back If the initial calm following the Then I fled out the back door and hid in as long as the current government is in Supreme Court’s upholding of the the bush.” Travelling by foot, and by boat power.” election results prevails, this under- and then by a people smugglers’ truck, Unlike many countries, where standable caution shown by the refugees she eventually reached South Africa. But refugees and asylum seekers are confined in South Africa may gradually shift into

“I can’t talk about integration at this stage — there are so many obstacles.”

REFUGEES 19 Last summer’s 34-day war in Lebanon, which displaced more than a million people, caught the world totally by surprise. Seven UNHCR staff members who worked in the region during the crisis describe their experiences during the war and in its immediate aftermath.

A UNHCR aid convoy enters the town of Siddiqine in southern Lebanon. Lebanon

20 REFUGEES The Diarists:

CAROL EL SAYED (CS), 30, Lebanese. Current posting: Lebanon. ARAFAT JAMAL (AJA), 36, American. Current posting: Lebanon. ARJUN JAIN (ARJ), 32, Indian. Current posting: Geneva. ASTRID VAN GENDEREN STORT (AvGS), 39, Dutch. Current posting: Geneva. MICHAEL BAVLY (MB), 71, Israeli. UNHCR Honorary Representative, Jerusalem. ANNETTE REHRL (AR), 43, German. Current posting: Liberia. LISA QUARSHIE (LQ), 37, Ghanaian. Current posting: Ghana.

Wednesday |12 |July EMAIL FROM UNHCR BEIRUT TO UNHCR HQ IN GENEVA You have probably heard about the reported kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers by Hezbollah, in the south. We will be monitoring the situation to see what consequences this might have.

SWEDEN (CS):“Carol, it doesn’t seem like you’ll be returning to Beirut soon. The airport was just hit.” That was how I first learned about the situation in Lebanon: from my fiancé as we walked out of the door to visit relatives. We had gone to Sweden together to visit his family. I was now stuck there, unable to go home, while he left five days later to Malaysia for work. I spent my remaining days in UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 Sweden trying to keep in touch with my family in Lebanon by telephone. I had a strong sense of disbelief about what was going on and the magnitude of it. I began picturing the bridges and areas where the shells were falling. Diaries Some were close to my home. I could not absorb the situation: I could not understand why my parents chose to remain at home despite attacks nearby;

REFUGEES 21 Lebanon Diaries

I could not understand why they simply Friday |21 |July schools in Aley [south-east of Beirut]. placed their most important documents BEIRUT (AJA):The disaster Conditions are precarious. People sleep near the door and slept in their clothes, professionals are arriving, and with three families to a room, and there is rather than seek refuge somewhere else them a new vocabulary and aesthetic. one toilet per 75 persons. The food straight away. The starched shirts and Dior scarves stocks will hardly last the next two days. The news spoke of refugees in that once marked the elegant UN House The bathrooms are clean: a disciplined Lebanon. Despite working with are giving way to safari shirts and and systematic cleaning rota is in place. UNHCR, it took me a couple of days to photographer vests, and even in town, The first line of response has been realize that “refugees” didn’t just mean the few remaining restaurants are being undertaken by the people themselves foreigners any more – I myself was now, taken over by a blonder, hairier, and and the authorities. It appears, at first in a way, a refugee. more earnest crowd. It's the Sarajevo, glance, to be professional, swift and Loki or Kabul look, and a far cry from coordinated. These people have been Saturday |15 |July the glamour, gorgeousness and limitless through war before, and they know REPORT FROM UNHCR BEIRUT TO HQ superficiality of the Beirut that we what to expect, and what to do. Important targets (airports, knew only ten days ago. Entry of humanitarian personnel to bridges, roads) located all The new people are good, Lebanon has been suspended. Our over the country have been hit. professional… give off an air of Emergency Team is gathering in The country is effectively competence, and show an inspiring Damascus. I hope that permission will sealed off from the outside willingness to work as a team, and to be granted in the next 48 hours. If not, world. we will have to consider other options. BEIRUT (AJA):Some of the Lebanese staff have DAMASCUS(ARJ):Thou- sought safety in their sands of refugees are ancestral mountain villages. arriving every day and I am trying to call everyone many of them are in bad at least once every 48 condition. We have been hours, to see if they are safe. trying to ensure they can They want to help get safely into Syria and displaced people who are receive the food, shelter and starting to arrive in their other basics they need to get home areas, and I authorize by. The most destitute are them to do whatever they living in public buildings – can. They immediately schools, mosques and

begin purchasing UNHCR / J. OERLEMANS LBN•2006 churches. During the past mattresses, blankets and The southern suburbs of Beirut on 23 July, after week, we have distributed diapers, and enlisting repeated Israeli airstrikes. tons of blankets, mattresses, husbands, brothers and kitchen sets, clothes and other family members to other essential items to help kick-start the UN’s emergency refugees as well as host families who do response. Meanwhile, I sit listening to put aside institutional egos. not have money to keep hosting Lebanese the muffled sound of bombs pounding A crowd of 150 [refugees, asylum for a long period. away at the infrastructure. seekers and other foreigners] staged a I’ve had a total of about 20 hours sleep frustrated but also at times belligerent over the past seven days. New members Tuesday |18 |July demonstration in front of the office on of the team are not doing any better. My REPORT FROM UNHCR BEIRUT TO HQ Wednesday, demanding evacuation. diet consists largely of a healthy dose of UNHCR will play a role with Emotions were at a fever pitch, with the cigarettes and Coke, with a splattering of internally displaced people sound of bombing in the background, a sandwiches and I have been spending (IDPs) in the context of the thick summer heat and the knowledge my nights on the office couch. I only [new UN system-wide] “cluster that other, more fortunate foreigners realised it was my birthday this approach,” which in practical were leaving by the boatload. afternoon when my family called. terms means a close focus on protection and shelter (camps Saturday |22 |July Monday |24 |July are not currently a viable ALEY, LEBANON (AJA):We visited SWEDEN (CS):According to the option in Lebanon). some of the 38,000 IDPs residing in UNHCR website, 700,000 people have

22 REFUGEES now been displaced by the conflict. to help speed up clearances for convoys, Sunday |30 |July UNHCR is sending 19 emergency team free passage, cease fires etc. All they have DAMASCUS (AR): I arrived here from members “to augment its existing staff in to do is ask. Liberia two days ago. Damascus is getting Syria and Lebanon.” The teams are to fly overcrowded. The school we visited today in from UNHCR offices worldwide by the Saturday |29 |July is packed with women, children, babies, end of the week. I hope to be back there by BEIRUT (CS): After 14 hours of travel, elderly. They sit in the school’s courtyard, then too, to help out. and 12 hours at the Syria-Lebanon border, not knowing where to go or what to do. A I finally got home on a joint UN convoy 12-year-old girl, Alaa, runs towards me, in Friday |28 |July bringing 140 tonnes of UNHCR supplies need of a big hug. She is missing her mom. BEIRUT (AvGS):My first day in the into Lebanon. Some UNHCR emergency Alaa feels that she is now responsible for Beirut office, after several days the rest of her family – three stuck in Damascus. Everyone little sisters and an aunt. She is is running around. Most of the skinny, pale and so fragile – but Lebanese staff are out – at she talks like an adult. What home, in the mountains, will this experience do to her, displaced themselves. The once she really grows up? driver tells me he is from south Beirut. His house has BEIRUT (AvGS):It may be not been bombed “yet,” he says Sunday, but there’s no chance to – but he left just in case. He rest. The news cries out about tries to be upbeat. “As long as this morning’s Israeli air strike we all stay alive, I do not care in the southern village of Qana. about my belongings.” It seems at least 28 people were

We’re trying to do ©AFP / R. SCHUTZER ISR•2006 killed, including children, something for the hundreds Israel: Aftermath of a Hezbollah rocket strike though some are reporting and thousands of displaced. on the port city of Haifa (above). almost twice that number. My But how? Not only is the Lebanese photographer friend south of Lebanon being Lebanon: Displaced people living rough has already seen the photos. bombed, also Beirut, the in a park in downtown Beirut (below). She sounds so numb, whereas Beqaa Valley, the main roads, she is normally so cheerful. It the strategic points. We are makes me shiver. curtailed in our movements At 12:00, I check the TV – by security rules and we try and see the main UN building to find a way round, without in downtown Lebanon, with breaking the rules. We have some 5,000 protesters bought goods in the local ramming the doors, breaking shops – while waiting for our the windows. I call out to my trucks from Syria to get into colleagues in the office: “The Lebanon – and had the shops UN building is being deliver the goods to many attacked!” people in need. That way, we We stare at the screen in avoid the requirement to disbelief…there are hundreds have UN security and Israeli UNHCR / J. MATTHEWS LBN•2006 of colleagues from other military clearances for the agencies inside. bigger truck convoys. Our own team members were on the same convoy. In the end, no one is badly hurt. displaced staff are continuing their When we arrived in Beirut, some of them As the day passes, it is more and more work with hundreds of thousands of commented that everything looked clear that these protesters are mainly other displaced people in districts north normal. It was not the case. The area we crying out for attention – utterly and south of Beirut. A drop in the were in used to be bustling with traffic distraught at what is happening in ocean, perhaps, but still important. and people. To my eyes, it looked eerily Lebanon, calling out to the UN at large: deserted. This was not the way I left Do something – stop this! Many Israelis Friday |28 |July Beirut. and their supporters are also furious JERUSALEM (MB):I have told UNHCR I headed home while the international with the UN. They think we’re biased. HQ I am ready to liaise with the Israeli staff undertook a security briefing. I Not for the first time, we take flak from Defence Forces and Ministry of Defence wanted to attend it. I was afraid. all sides.

REFUGEES 23 Lebanon Diaries

Experts believe it may take ringing. Why can’t the world always another year to clear the cohabit like this? I ask myself. one million unexploded BEIRUT (AvGS): cluster bombs, shells, I watch early morning TV again: Hezbollah fired more rockets and other LEBANON than 200 rockets into Israel; and Israeli ordnance scattered troops have carried out a raid in Baalbek – across Lebanon. the deepest attack yet. Baalbek A lot of sadness in the office. No one Beirut can escape this war. In the capitals, and at the Security Council, the talk continues. In the meantime, we continue trying to get goods to the people, but we are running out of fuel. There are sea and air blockades – and Sidon queues of hundreds of cars in front of Damascus the petrol stations. Friday |4 |August SYRIAN ARAB REPUBLIC SAFITA, SYRIA (LQ): I met Nour, a Tyre 7-year-old girl living with her mother and little brother in the Al Ja’afari hospital in Kiryat Shemona Safita. She hesitantly touched the skin on my arms – and held on to my hand when I Bent Jbail Known locations of unexploded cluster bombs and other ordnance, smiled. She asked if I could bring her Ayta-e-Shaab Maroun el Ras as of 20 November 2006. milk, shoes and clothes, since her mother ISRAEL had forgotten to bring any. Her mother, with her young son on her hip, added that SOURCE: UN MINE ACTION COORDINATION CENTRE their house near Tyre had been completely destroyed. Monday |31 |July blankets and 500 mattresses as part of the BEIRUT (AvGS):A 48-hour halt to the UN joint convoy to the beleaguered BEIRUT (AvGS): From the balcony, I air strikes in southern Lebanon is villages in the south. The convoy takes can see huge smoke clouds over Beirut. announced – to allow the people trapped hours to get there because of all the traffic Three or four main bridges on the coast in the south to leave, and an investigation coming the other way. Because of the lull road from Syria to Beirut – the main into the Qana attack to take place. in the fighting, people are trying to get out humanitarian corridor, which we take all However, after about seven hours, new – by car, on foot, anyway they can. the time – have been bombed. The other reports of fighting across the border – both I get a media SMS ways. What a sick crisis. Journalists who alert: “Israeli troops are call me from the south tell me it is scary pushing towards the down there: a lot of destruction, dazed Litani River.” The people, trapped people, old people who sit cessation of hostilities – if in their dining rooms refusing to leave there ever really was one their homes. – is over. Back to war. Tuesday |1 |August Wednesday BEIRUT (CS): I have to find my niche 2 |August in this operation which has spiralled from DAMASCUS (AR): Each around a thousand foreign refugees living morning, on our way to the in urban areas to almost a million Damascus office, we pass displaced Lebanese scattered all across the two churches and a country, or over the border in Syria. mosque, standing next to UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 Nowhere feels safe anymore. each other. We hear the UNHCR trucked in hundreds of tonnes of aid, Muezzins calling for prayer including these tents, from Jordan to Syria. BEIRUT (AvGS): Today we send 1,000 and the church bells

24 REFUGEES road from Damascus to Beirut mass influx of Lebanese was bombed a while back. refugees into Germany. The Slowly but surely the main interviewer asks me whether I arteries inside Lebanon are perceive this “danger” too. I being cut. The Israelis say it is have difficulty remaining because they are being used to polite. Oh, Europe! supply Hezbollah. I call a pregnant colleague Friday |11 |August BEIRUT (CS): who uses that route to come ©REUTERS / Y. WEITZMAN ISR•2006 The situation to work. “It feels like a wound Israel: An apartment in Kiryat Shemona, hit by one of is getting increasingly difficult that was nearly closed, has some 4,000 rockets fired into Israel. as the days go by. The water been ripped open again,” she systems are not equipped to host says, referring to the 15-year Lebanon: UNHCR staffer with a displaced woman such large numbers of people. civil war that ended in 1990. and her newborn baby. There are reports of lice and All the staff are shaken and scabies among the displaced and scared. some medicines are in short According to Lebanese supply. I’m seeing a lot of government figures, 903 lethargy – especially among people have been killed and adolescents. There are many 3,293 injured. And dozens of pregnant women. Most don’t people have also been killed know where to go to give birth. in Israel. Host families are being inundated with displaced Sunday |6 |August relatives – and they’re getting TALAT AL KHEDER (LQ): little in the way of support. I am amazed at the level of They say it’s too difficult to hospitality the Syrians are arrange. I guess it’s much UNHCR / J. MATTHEWS LBN•2006 showing to the refugees. We easier to deal with the Ghanaians may have some lessons to learn leave my home when bombs fell on a collective centres. about hospitality to displaced people. building about 400 metres away. Dozens The children’s faces are becoming During a visit to the refugees living in the are reported to have been killed. People increasingly grey and pale. Most of the Talat Al Kheder mosque, some teenagers living nearby evacuated their homes and food is canned. There is hardly any playing football became interested when headed towards the already crowded fresh meat or vegetables. they realized I am from Ghana, and asked centres and public parks in the city centre. me lots of questions about our team’s Monday |14 |August performance in the World Cup. Tuesday |8 |August BEIRUT-SIDON HIGHWAY (ARJ): DAMASCUS (AR): The Lebanese keep We haven’t needed alarm clocks to wake BEIRUT (AvGS): coming – and the Syrians keep up. The bombings at 5:00 am every There are some 900,000 people accommodating them. The Syrian morning have been sufficient. Today at displaced on this side – 700,000 within Government does not want to speak about 8:00 a.m., the ceasefire took effect under Lebanon and nearly 200,000 in Syria – ‘refugees.’ “These are our guests,” they say. Security Council Resolution 1701. There is as well as half a million in northern And as guests they are treated. I’m really a silence on the streets of Beirut – the Israel. In displacement terms, it’s worse impressed. Village committees turn up to sound of disbelief that the bombs have than Kosovo. cook three meals a day for them; local actually stopped after 34 days. people lend strangers their mobile phones By 9:00 a.m., thousands of people Monday |7 |August to call home; rich and poor Syrians open were returning home in southern BEIRUT (CS): I have been working their homes to Lebanese families. Clothes, Lebanon – an estimated 6,000 people with the displaced during the day and toys, prayer mats and money are donated every hour. I met an 8-year-old girl who spending sleepless nights fearing the by private citizens. This is so rewarding to told me she was keen to go back because worst, as bombs fell nearby. I live in Chiah witness. The interest of the international she had left her favourite doll at home [part of Dahiyeh, the mainly Shia media is enormous. Some of them seem and wanted to make sure it was not southern suburbs of Beirut]. It had been surprised to hear that Syrians can be hurt. Her parents told me later that they considered a safe area, and people fleeing generous. I get an urgent phone call from a don't even know if the house is other parts of the country had sought German TV station. The German standing, or where they will get their refuge there. But today I was forced to Parliament is discussing how to prevent a next meal.

REFUGEES 25 Lebanon Diaries UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 A girl shortly after returning to her apartment in the Lebanese village of Ayta-e-Shaab.

BEIRUT (AvGS): They are all on the “What’s happening there in Lebanon? Are the time we just wave goodbye. The road! Thousands of displaced Lebanese people going home?” I say they are, and returnees are in too much of a hurry – wanting to see their homes – see if they tell them I hope all the Israelis displaced they don’t even have time to stop. Their are still there. No more dependency on by the Hezbollah rocket attacks will now joy is highly contagious. “No matter others. No more displacement. be able to do so as well. how much destruction awaits us – we Thousands are stuck in traffic jams, want to go home!” And off they drive. waiting hours. It is wonderful to see the YABOUS BORDER, SYRIA (AR): packed cars, stuffed with mattresses and It is unbelievably hot. Our team stands Tuesday |15 |August blankets and children. An Israeli media at the border, handing out bottles of JERUSALEM (MB): The war in outlet interviews me on the phone: water and return packages. But most of Lebanon has exacted a heavy toll in Israel

26 REFUGEES UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 ABOVE: A young mother inspects her bedroom in Ayta-e-Shaab. Her house had been used as an impromptu clinic for wounded Israeli soldiers.

BELOW: A couple in their living room in another Lebanese village, Ayn Ibil. UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 too. In all, 3,970 missiles were fired by has not, however, necessitated an 2,015 casualties (of whom 53 were killed). Hezbollah at cities and villages in the intervention by UNHCR. The The casualties have included many Israeli north prior to the ceasefire. Some 2,000 government has supplied free hotel Arabs as the population of Haifa is mixed, houses were damaged and several rooms, NGOs have mobilized, and and Central Galilee is mostly Arab. hundred completely destroyed. The kibbutzim in the south are hosting the number of people displaced is estimated at kibbutzim from the north. In addition, Friday |18 |August 500,000 – around half of the one million some rich entrepreneurs have built free TYRE (AvGS): We came south to Tyre people living within range of the “summer camps” on the beach. Everybody yesterday. Before that, it had been more or Hezbollah missiles – including some has a “northerner” in their home, but he less off limits. The four of us are working 180,000 from the city of Haifa alone. This or she is a worried guest: there have been out of a single tiny room. It is actually

REFUGEES 27 Unexploded cluster bombs are small, deadly and very hard to spot. UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 A cluster bomb in the garden…

quite funny, and we laugh a lot in between Saturday |19 |August in order to save them from the fighting the madness and sadness of it all. Grumpy TYRE (ARJ): We have visited some of and shelling. But their truck was faces, stress behind laptops, filled ashtrays, the most devastated villages in Lebanon bombed on its way north and 23 of those running around to find our bearings, load such as Ayta-e-Shaab and Bent Jbail, close on board, mostly children, were killed. trucks, recruit national staff. to the Israeli border. The devastation is We try to get out – to visit the displaced, shocking. Over 80 percent of Ayta-e- Sunday |20 |August to assess the destruction and to help in Shaab is destroyed. Yet hundreds of people LEBANON-ISRAEL BORDER (AvGS): whatever way we can. UN security is have already returned. They tell us they I go out on a joint UN assessment. My strict: the Israeli army is still in the south, are sleeping 20-30 per room. They have first trip close to the border with Israel. and there are cluster bombs everywhere. nothing – no water, no blankets, no We cross villages that just seem to have Nasty little black things with white mattresses, no houses – but are gone – to have been erased, turned into ribbons that can kill a human being. determined to stay. rubble. I feel numb and sick at the sight. Wherever we go, we are escorted by In another heavily destroyed village, In just 34 days… so much destruction, as armoured vehicles. What a nightmare. We Marwaheen, they described their if some giant hand has tried to sweep need to get close to the people – and the biggest tragedy: the villagers had sent the villages off the map. Yellow banners last thing they want to see right now is a away 27 children, elderly and other supporting Hezbollah are everywhere, tank or armoured car. vulnerable family members on a truck as well as anti-US signs.

28 REFUGEES In the bedroom … UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 In the kitchen…

And under the we are able to do much more. We have now tobacco plants in the back yard. distributed tons of tents, mattresses, clothes and other items that the people need to survive in southern Lebanon. Other agencies are distributing food and water. We have concentrated on the 30 most affected towns in Lebanon to begin UNHCR / A. VAN GENDEREN STORT / LBN•2006 with, and are now moving to other villages. Monday |28 |August Wednesday |30 |August MAROUN EL RAS, LEBANON (AvGS): TYRE (AJA): Saturday |2 |September Maroun el Ras. On the hills overlooking I spent the day in villages near Tyre – AYTA-E-SHAAB (AvGS): I take a film Israel. It is like Armageddon. A cold Aynata, Ayta al Jabal, Haddathah. We crew to Ayta-e-Shaab. In one house, we wind blows, an eery atmosphere. Some have all seen enough pictures to know find traces of blood, and discarded drips UN peacekeepers. Silence. Emptiness. what a flattened house looks like, but to used for wounded Israeli soldiers. Even the black crows have gone. I want travel in this area is to see the sheer Explosives can be seen embedded in walls, to get out of here. quantity of destruction. I am sure that fields, floors. Bulldozers and house-to- A few people materialize on the some civilian-looking houses may have house fighting erased the original town outskirts of the village, and we contained military targets, but to hit layout, and it will have to be completely distribute some relief items. I detect a house after house after house? redesigned. woman behind the bars of a window and A destroyed house has been ripped talk to her in a mix of broken Arabic Friday |1 |September wide open on one side, exposing a pink and sign language. TYRE (ARJ): Our team has grown and family couch.

REFUGEES 29 Tuesday |5 |September BEIRUT (CS): We are continuing to help displaced people in the north as well as the south – Mount Lebanon, Jbeil, Kesrouane, Metn, Aley, Chouf, Baabda and Baalbek. However, I am now working in Dahiyeh – the southern suburbs of Beirut. Around 5,000 housing units here have been completely destroyed or partially damaged – and almost all its residents were displaced. The people of Dahiyeh – mostly lower-middle class and the poor – have been grateful for the items we have distributed. This has created space for us to carry out home visits to see displaced people and learn more about their situation, priorities and concerns. Many are really struggling financially, and some of the women note that their children are growing more aggressive.

30 REFUGEES Thursday |7 |September TYRE (AvGS): My friend was out in her car yesterday. She passed a kid on a moped. He had a clusterbomb in his mouth, the An old woman surveys white ribbon the southern suburbs of Beirut. between his teeth. Swinging it back and forth, he was laughing and racing around. She got him to stop – for fear of her own life as well as his – and managed to get a de-miner to come over. He finally got the boy to part with the cluster bomb. It turned out to be a dud – but it could have been totally different.

I’m leaving UNHCR / J. OERLEMANS LBN•2006 Tyre for Beirut this afternoon. Tomorrow I’m due to repeatedly over the past few weeks, since head on to Damascus, then back to moving here from Damascus. Europe. I feel totally dazed. I’ve seen Dahiyeh from a distance, but only now am I actually entering it. Sunday |10 |September The reality dwarfs all the images I’ve TYRE (ARJ): The UN Mine Action seen. They lack the smell, the taste, the UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 Co-ordination Centre (UNMACC) – on dust hanging in the air, the anger whose premises in Tyre we initially lived, simmering among the rows of collapsed worked, ate and slept – has been extremely apartment buildings. Some buildings gracious towards us. And it’s a good thing crashed totally, others remain standing they are in southern Lebanon. There are in the midst of tonnes of rubble – believed to be around a million cluster “partially destroyed” in UN bomblets littering the country, a terminology. I spot a family living on significant proportion of them dropped in one floor in a building that is close to civilian areas and on farmland during the collapse. At least that is how it looks to last 72 hours before the ceasefire took me. The scene is apocalyptic. We drive effect. For the Lebanese, the war is not by. Angry young men, clearing the over: men, women and children continue rubble, glance at our UN car. The to be killed by the cluster bombs. We are atmosphere is tense. Street after street, providing some logistical support to try the same impression. It leaves me and help UNMACC in their valiant appalled. Nobody on the team feels like efforts to clear the bombs. speaking. As UNHCR staff, we visit such places and then we go back to our Sunday |24 |September office as if nothing happened. However, BEIRUT (AR): It is a quiet Sunday these images stay with us. Deep inside, morning. The city is still asleep. We have a they do something to us, gradually meeting in Dahiyeh, Beirut’s most change us. While driving through destroyed neighbourhood. I have seen Dahiyeh, your heart seems to stop pictures in magazines. I have seen the beating. But there are no words that bombs falling on TV. I’ve been visiting really express how that feels, just as

UNHCR / A. BRANTHWAITE LBN•2006 displaced people in neighbouring districts there are no pictures.

REFUGEES 31