| Congo Newsbriefs 9/18/97 Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit source: congo-news@thor.cmp.ilstu.edu Massacre probe appears on hold after new Congo objections 12.42 p.m. EDT (1642 GMT) September 16, 1997 By Kamanga Mutond,Associated Press KINSHASA, Congo (AP) Congolese officials objected Tuesday to U.N. investigators' demands to search for mass graves in western Congo, a sign that the inquiry into alleged massacres again would be delayed. Government Minister Etienne Mbaya told investigators they must adhere to a commitment by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to limit the investigation to Congo's far east. On Monday, the 23-member team demanded permission to search Mbandaka, in western Congo, where it suspects Kabila's army may have massacred Rwandan Hutu refugees. Mbaya also said the team must conclude its investigation by Dec. 31, the date agreed to by both sides. There was no immediate reaction from the United Nations, but Mbaya's statement was likely to increase tensions between the U.N. team and government officials, who maintain the world body has unjustly accused them of atrocities. Kabila took power in Congo the former Zaire in May after leading his rebel army in a sweep that began in the far east, an area heavily populated at the time by refugees from neighboring Rwanda. The refugees were mainly Hutus who had fled Rwanda fearing retaliation for the 1994 Hutu-orchestrated massacre of Rwandan Tutsis. Kabila's Tutsi-backed movement is accused of murdering Hutus and burying thousands of them in mass graves. The government denies the accusations and has insisted it is not preventing the United Nations from investigating. But each time the U.N. team has tried to get started, Congolese officials accuse it of changing the scope of the inquiry and of violating terms of the investigation. Among other things, it has accused the team of bias against the government, and of ignoring atrocities allegedly committed under the regime of Mobutu Sese Seko, who was ousted by Kabila in May. The United States has warned that its promises of aid to Kabila depend on his cooperation with the U.N. investigation. "I don't believe it's reached a stage where drastic action is needed,'' said Bill Richardson, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. "But we're close.'' U.N. team says it still hopes to begin investigation in Congo 7.58 p.m. EDT (2358 GMT) September 18, 1997 By Tim Sullivan,Associated Press KINSHASA, Congo (AP) U.N. investigators sent to Congo to look into reports of refugee massacres said Thursday they still hope to go ahead with their probe despite disagreements that have stalled the inquiry for weeks. "We have to pursue all avenues to get this investigation going,'' Jose Diaz, the team spokesman, said. "We're aware of the consequences that the failure of the mission would have on decisions to give reconstruction aid to the country.'' Bill Richardson, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations who is serving as president of the U.N. Security Council this month, discussed the problems with Congolese President Laurent Kabila on Thursday. "We spoke this morning for 30 minutes. Slight progress was made in that telephone conversation ... on beginning the team's mission,'' Richardson told reporters in New York. "There was an agreement to end inflammatory statements on the issue,'' Richardson said. "We agreed to hold back on those because that, in their judgment, is clouding the situation.'' He did not provide details. Kabila also was to speak with U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Thursday. U.N. officials said they did not have details of that conversation. "There is not a satisfactory outcome yet,'' Richardson said. "This mission should have full access. They should have a license to, under their mandate, investigate reports of atrocities on the eastern side and throughout the country.'' The United States and other donor nations have said they will tie future aid to Kabila's commitment to human rights, including his pursuit of perpetrators of alleged massacres of Rwandan refugees. Richardson said in July that Kabila had agreed to let the United Nations investigate the alleged killings, but repeated attempts to start the probe have been blocked by disagreements between the U.N. and Kabila's government over its scope. The latest investigative team reconstituted after Kabila rejected the first team arrived in Kinshasa more than three weeks ago but has not been able to begin work. On Tuesday, government minister Etienne Mbaya objected to U.N. investigators' demands that they be allowed to begin searching for mass graves in western Congo, telling them an agreement with Annan limited the team to the eastern part of the country. U.N. investigators say that the geographic restriction and other stipulations the Congolese government insists upon were never agreed to. Kabila's government denies its soldiers took part in any massacres during their eight-month rebellion, which began in September and ended in May when Kabila's army reached Kinshasa. The Tutsi-led force is accused of killing thousands of refugees as they swept across the country, targeting camps to retaliate for the 1994 genocide against Rwandan Tutsis. Most of the refugees were Rwandan Hutus who fled their homeland to escape punishment for the Hutu-orchestrated slaughter. Mobutu death complicates search for assets 7.08 p.m. EDT (2308 GMT) September 18, 1997 By Clare Nullis,Associated Press GENEVA (AP) Mobutu Sese Seko has taken many of the secrets of his legendary fortune with him to the grave. The Sept. 7 death of Zaire's ousted dictator has complicated the already difficult task of tracing his wealth. It raises the prospect of years of court battles between his country's new government - which considers much of the money stolen - and Mobutu's heirs. "The legal proceedings will continue following his death, but I can't say it will make it any easier,'' said Folco Galli, a spokesman for the Justice Ministry in Switzerland, which has taken the lead in freezing Mobutu assets. During more than 30 years in control of the coffers of his potentially rich nation, Mobutu piled up huge wealth, distributing it among cronies and transferring it to foreign bank accounts. Mobutu insisted that he had never "pocketed one dollar of the people's money,'' and was worth no more than $5 million. But the man once called a "walking bank account'' by a top French official was estimated by the French magazine VSD on Thursday to have a fortune of between $3.3 and $7.5 billion. Mobutu's family is believed to have luxury properties dotting the world. VSD said these included 11 estates in Zaire now renamed Congo as well as hotels and homes in Morocco, Senegal, Ivory Coast, Chad, Kenya, Canada, Switzerland, France, Belgium, Portugal, Brazil and Italy. It is unclear how much of his money Mobutu spent as he tried to cling to power. By the time he died in exile in Morocco, only $3.3 million in secret Swiss bank accounts had been traced. Congo's foreign minister, Bizima Karaha, refuses to speculate on the current scope and whereabouts of the Mobutu fortune, yet he is adamant about where it should end up. "That money belongs to this country,'' Karaha said recently. "Our people will do everything to get it back.'' But the Congolese government, struggling amid the shambles left by Mobutu, hasn't even seriously tried to track down funds in many countries. It is not even known whether Mobutu made a will specifying how to distribute his wealth among his wives and extended family. Legally, there is nothing to prevent his heirs from inheriting his luxury Mediterranean villa in France and property in central Paris. The government there has taken no action to freeze his assets. The same is true in South Africa and most other countries. Belgium, the former colonial power in Congo, has blocked some assets, including the reported $3.3 million proceeds from the sale of a villa in that country. It is in Switzerland long regarded as a safe haven for dictators' dirty money and the suspected site of the biggest chunk of the Mobutu fortune that authorities have taken the most sweeping measures to find the late president's money. The government granted the Kinshasa government's request to freeze all Mobutu family assets, including proceeds from the sale of his Lake Geneva villa valued at more than $2.75 million. It is also considering a demand to expand the freeze to cover Mobutu's former ministers and associates. Karaha, the Congolese foreign minister, is expected to press the demand during an official visit to Switzerland on Friday. So far, a search for Mobutu family accounts in 400 commercial banks ordered by Switzerland's regulatory Federal Banking Commission has uncovered just $3.3 million just a fraction of the $2.7 billion the Congo government maintains is stashed in Switzerland. "Ninety percent of the Mobutu money is not under the Mobutu name,'' argues Jean Ziegler, a Swiss lawmaker who is trying to help trace the wealth in Switzerland. "The problem is that during 32 years Mr. Mobutu, in collaboration with Swiss banks, built an empire of offshore companies on the Cayman Islands and trust funds in Liechtenstein, as well as shares in industry and holding companies,'' Ziegler said in a telephone interview. Ziegler, a longtime critic of Swiss banks, said the only way to find out the true extent and location of the Mobutu family wealth is to scrap Swiss banking secrecy laws. While there is no chance of that happening soon, the Swiss say they are doing their utmost to help the Congo government. Although Mobutu himself is dead, experts say Congolese authorities should still pursue funds in Switzerland belonging to the entire Mobutu family. "The Marcos example shows that when someone dies, the case can continue,'' said Galli, the Justice Ministry spokesman. But it is the prospect of a repeat of the Marcos fiasco that fills Swiss bankers and their critics alike with dread. The battle to recover $500 million in assets linked to the late Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos is now in its 11th year. The money, blocked in Swiss banks, is subject to competing claims from Marcos heirs, the Philippine government, a business corporation and victims of human rights abuses during his 21-year rule. "I am very much worried that the Mobutu proceedings will go on for as long as the Marcos case,'' said Ziegler. Click here Zaire massacre probe in crisis - U.N. rights chief 11:28 a.m. Sep 18, 1997 Eastern By Elif Kaban GENEVA, Sept 18 (Reuter) - The new U.N. human rights chief, former Irish president Mary Robinson, voiced deep concern on Thursday at Kinshasa's obstruction of a U.N. inquiry into alleged massacres of Rwandan Hutu refugees. Describing it as a ``crisis situation,'' she said at her first news conference in office that the issue was being dealt with directly by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan in hourly contacts with her office. ``This is clearly a fundamentally important political issue and there are very important human rights issues,'' said the chief of the Geneva-based U.N. human rights office. ``I attach the greatest importance to the work of the team and I'm deeply conscious and deeply troubled by the difficulties it encountered,'' she said. ``This team is an effort on behalf of the United Nations and the Secretary-General to combat impunity in violation of human rights and international humanitarian laws which tragically has become all too common in our landscape.'' The team trying to carry out the investigation, which diplomats say was inherently flawed after U.N. concessions on its terms and mandate, has been stuck for a month in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It has been blocked from going to the east, where aid officials say President Laurent Kabila's troops backed by Rwandan Tutsi soldiers systematically massacred tens of thousands of Rwandan refugees in the former Zaire. Robinson, who vowed to be outspoken in dealing with abuses around the world, did not say what recommendation she made to a special task force created by Annan that was to meet in New York on Thursday to discuss the crisis. She said Annan, who ordered the mission, was reviewing the situation in light of latest statements from Kabila's government. Kinshasa's U.N. ambassador Andre Kapanga said on Wednesday his government had no intention of allowing an inquiry into events after the period of Kabila's takeover in May. Annan appointed the team after Kabila's government blocked a previous mission headed by investigator Roberto Garreton of Chile, whom it accused of bias. Human rights groups have criticised Annan's dropping of Garreton as setting a dangerous precedent. Washington, which has been supportive of Kabila and also has close military and political ties with Rwanda, was instrumental in getting Annan to organise his own investigation, sparing Kabila from international isolation. Annan also gave in to Kabila's demand to backdate the inquiry to 1993 when late dictator Mobutu Sese Seko was in power, but to no avail. Each time, Kinshasa has come up with fresh demands. Click here for a FREE Launch CD-ROM UNHCR worried over new ethnic clashes in ex-Zaire 12:32 a.m. Sep 17, 1997 Eastern GENEVA, Sept 16 (Reuter) - The United Nations refugee agency on Tuesday expressed concern about renewed ethnic clashes in northeast Democratic Republic of the Congo, which it said sent 3,300 Tutsis fleeing over the border into Rwanda at the weekend. The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) also confirmed that its ``search and rescue operations'' aimed at locating 25,000 Rwandan Hutu refugees believed to be hiding in the forest in former Zaire had been halted. Sadako Ogata, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees told the Security Council last week that she was suspending some operations in Laurent Kabila's Congo because of the country's recent expulsion of 775 Rwandans and Burundis. The Kinshasa government had failed to guarantee basic protection standards. Spokeswoman Pamela O'Toole, speaking to a news briefing, said the Geneva-based agency was pulling staff out of central Democratic Republic of Congo but had no intention of totally withdrawing and ``leaving people to fend for themselves.'' Since Ogata's announcement, small groups of Hutu refugees were coming out of the forest seeking repatriation, she added. In all, 200,000 Rwandans refugees remain unaccounted for following alleged massacres by Tutsi-led rebels and Rwandan backers during a seven-month military campaign that toppled President Mobutu Sese Seko and brought Kabila to power last May. More than a million Rwandan Hutus streamed into eastern Zaire in 1994 fearing reprisals for the genocide of more than 500,000 minority Tutsis or their sympathisers by hardline Hutus. Meanwhile, the agency expressed concern about ethnic clashes in the northeast Masisi region, an ethnic tinderbox west of Goma where rival tribes have fought each other on and off since 1993. ``Fighting has reportedly sent about 8,000 residents of the Masisi region fleeing into Goma town over the past several weeks,'' O'Toole said. ``Over the weekend, 3,330 of them, mainly ethnic Tutsi, crossed the border into Gisenyi in Rwanda,'' she added. The refugees from the former Zaire are in Mudende camp, in Gisenyi, which last month was attacked by armed men. About 148 people died then, most of them Congolese Tutsi refugees. The whereabouts of the other 4,670 civilians from the Masisi region was not immediately known. They may have fled to surrounding villages or returned home. Not all were Tutsis. In all, there are now at least 15,800 Tutsi refugees from the Democratic Republic of Congo in Rwanda, UNHCR said. Congo's U.N. envoy says probe limits non-negotiable 08:20 p.m Sep 17, 1997 Eastern By Evelyn Leopold UNITED NATIONS, Sept 17 (Reuter) - Congo's new U.N. ambassador on Wednesday said his government had no intention of allowing the United Nations to probe alleged massacres of Rwandan refugees after President Laurent Kabila took power. ``Otherwise it means our country is on probation. And that is not negotiable,'' said Andre Kapanga, who until recently was a professor of applied linguistics and French in the United States, at the University of Nebraska and at Illinois State University. ``We have said that we want the team to start working,'' he said in an interview with Reuters. ``The terms do not have to be imposed on a country. They have to be based on mutual respect and cooperation.'' Kapanga said the team would not be permitted to probe alleged killings after May 17, when Kabila took power and it had to confine its work to the eastern Congo and not Mbandaka in the northwest as it recently requested. ``We believe there aren't any grave sites in the western part of the country. Those are our limits,'' he said, adding that he would convey this policy to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan shortly. Kabila's government has clashed with the United Nations on a variety of issues in recent months. The latest was a series of obstacles thrown in the way of a human rights team probing the massacres of Rwandan Hutus, allegedly killed by Tutsi forces loyal to Kabila before and after his successful campaign to take power. The probe by a U.N. team that has been in Kinshasa for a month could become a major factor in future relations between leading Western nations and Kabila's government, which toppled Zaire's veteran dictator, Mobutu Sese Seko. If the team leaves without being able to investigate any sites, Kabila's image would be damaged and future aid could be jeopardized. But indications are that the United Nations and the United States, Britain and other countries supportive of Kabila are hesitant in recommending drastic economic action. Annan expected the mission ``to make every effort to commence its investigation in accordance with the mandate,'' said his spokesman Fred Eckhard on Wednesday. U.S. Ambassador Bill Richardson has also commented that no one wanted to see the team return empty-handed. Asked about the danger of an aid cut off, Kapanga said that if the Congo government were not able to function, the entire region would be destabilized. ``We strongly believe that they should allow the countries to start rebuilding.'' Kapanga also defended his govenment's demand for two dozen Congolese security personnel to accompany the group at the expense of the United Nations. He said there were still reports of clashes in the eastern Congo and ``if something happened, our government would be responsible.'' Kapanga appeared perplexed at the pressure put on his country, saying the new government has not executed or jailed followers of Mobutu on political grounds. He blamed the United Nations and the international community for not doing anything to stop the 1994 genocide in Rwanda and then setting up refugee camps in the former Zaire for Rwandan Hutus. The Hutus, fearing revenge, fled after the genocide, initiated by militant Hutus against the Tutsi minority. Aid groups say thousands were killed, including innocent women and children. As Kapanga sees it, the perpetrators of the genocide went to the former Zaire, attacked local Tutsis and later fought alongside Mobutu's forces. ``The frontline was in essense the areas where you have refugees with women and children being systematically used as human shields,'' he said. ``The people who committed genocide are now being treated as refugees. It is outrageous,'' he said. Congo says U.N. commission meddling in politics 02:49 p.m Sep 16, 1997 Eastern By Geert De Clercq BRUSSELS, Sept 16 (Reuter) - A United Nations mission probing alleged massacres in the Democratic Republic of Congo (former Zaire) should stop meddling in the country's politics, Congo's foreign minister said on Tuesday. ``The U.N. commission...is more occupied with politics than with its inquiry,'' Bizima Karaha said at a joint news conference with Belgian Foreign Minister Erik Derycke in Brussels. Since the long-delayed U.N. mission arrived in Congo last month, the U.N. and the new regime in Congo have been wrangling over the 23-member commission's mandate and scope of action. Earlier on Tuesday a U.N. official in Kinshasa said the mission was in peril after the Congo government denied U.N. investigators permission to search for evidence of massacres of Rwandan Hutu refugees in the northern town of Mbandaka. ``The commission is going around asking opposition politicians whether our government is democratic. That is not its role,'' Karaha said. U.N. sources have said that the U.N. might pull its team out of Congo unless president Laurent Kabila's government is more cooperative. >From Kinshasa the U.N. mission said earlier this week it had formally demanded access to the interior after having been restricted to the capital for three weeks. ``The commission has not been blocked from going wherever it wants to go, but its missions must be limited in time and space,'' Karaha said. ``The commission can go to the east whenever it wants, but they do not want to. But they have to ask us. It needs protection, we must ensure their security.'' Derycke called on the Kabila government to settle its differences with the U.N., adding a resumption of international aid to the poor central African country could depend on this. He backed Karaha in his request to the commission not to interfere in the country's politics. ``Mr Karaha is right in saying that the commission must do its work, not get involved in politics,'' he said. ``It is important that we find out the truth.'' The investigation into alleged massacres of Rwandan Hutu refugees has become a bone of contention between Western nations and the Kabila government, which toppled Zaire's veteran dictator Mobutu Sese Seko last May. Human rights groups have alleged that Kabila's rebels and their Rwandan Tutsi allies carried out systematic genocide of Rwandan Hutus in camps in eastern Zaire. Kabila has repeatedly denied that there have ever been massacres among Rwandan refugees in Congo. ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytaf-09.24.97-12:10:38-16424 | |
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