As the war in eastern Zaire spreads west towards Kinshasa, the capital, and while Burundi and other neighbouring countries continue to be stricken by armed conflict and massive refugee movements, the United Nations on 19 March launched an appeal for $32 4.5 mn to meet the emergency humanitarian needs of more than 1.4 million people in the Great Lakes region.
Meanwhile, the UN, the Organization of African Unity (OAU) and a number of African governments have been urging the Zairian protagonists to sit down and talk. They insist that a ceasefire – or, failing that, a negotiated change in government – would greatly facilitate international relief efforts and minimize further regional instability. The opening of direct talks between the Zairian government and the rebel forces over the weekend of 4-5 April in South Africa, with joint UN/OAU Special Representative Mohamed Sahnoun serving as a mediator, was the first significant step in that direction.
"If we don't manage the change in Zaire, we may lose control of it," UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan warned on 16 April. To prevent the conflict from spiralling out of control, he urged "transitional arrangements in Zaire and eventually elections."
Dramatically underlining the humanitarian crisis in Zaire, relief organizations have been reporting alarmingly high death rates among refugees and displaced persons. In just the last two weeks of March, at least 500 Rwandese refugees in the Zairian village of Ubilo died of hunger and disease, according to the Zairian Red Cross. In village after village, reported a field representative of Refugees International, a non-governmental organization (NGO), "I saw the most emaciated children I've ever seen in my life." Local field officers of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) have described the situation as "catastrophic," reporting early April death rates of up to 120 a day in two makeshift camps south of Kisangani.
Mrs. Sadako Ogata, the High Commissioner for Refugees, urged the Zairian rebel forces who have taken control of most of eastern Zaire to open up humanitarian corridors, to allow the tens of thousands of Rwandese refugees trapped by the fighting to return home. "They are malnourished, traumatized and stricken with diseases," Mrs. Ogata said. "They have told us they want to end their agony and return to Rwanda." (Also see interview with Mrs. Ogata)
UNHCR, other UN agencies and NGOs have appealed to the rebel coalition to allow a UN airlift of some 100,000 malnourished Rwandese refugees back to their country. As of mid-April, agreement had not been reached.
Regional appeal
Because the situation in Zaire and neighbouring countries is highly fluid, with rapid shifts in both battlelines and affected populations, the UN emergency appeal takes a regional approach, to allow material and humanitarian aid personnel to be transferred at short notice to areas of greatest need. The changing situation in Zaire in particular, said the appeal, demands "a flexible and creative response from humanitarian agencies and their counterparts."
Covering the period January-December 1997, the UN Consolidated Inter-Agency Appeal for the Great Lakes Emergency was prepared by UN agencies and NGOs operating in the region. It aims to provide food, medicine, shelter and other emergency assistance to refugees, internally displaced people and returnees in Zaire, Burundi, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.
The bulk of the appeal's funds will be allocated to UNHCR ($116 mn), the World Food Programme ($145.5 mn) and UNICEF ($35 mn), with the remainder going to another half-dozen agencies. At the request of the Rwandese government, that country's humanitaria n needs were not included in the consolidated appeal, and it is negotiating separately with UNHCR and other agencies for assistance to returning refugees.
Fighting disrupts relief efforts
The rebellion in eastern Zaire, which began in October, pits a coalition known as the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire (ADFL) against the government of President Mobutu Sese Seko, who has ruled Zaire for 32 years. Since February, the ADFL, led by Mr. Laurent Désiré Kabila, has very rapidly seized an ever-growing swath of territory in the country's eastern, central and southern regions, as undisciplined government troops first engaged in widespread looting and then fled in the face of advancing rebel forces. By mid-April, the ADFL had captured three of the four largest cities (Lubumbashi, Kisangani and Mbuji-Mayi) and nearly half the country's territory, including virtually all the mining areas, from which Zaire derives the bulk of its foreign earnings.
Besides threatening the survival of Mr. Mobutu's regime, the rebel advances disrupted the ongoing efforts of international relief agencies to reach hundreds of thousands of Rwandese refugees, while also creating new populations of displaced Zairians.
Prior to the ADFL's victory in Kisangani, humanitarian organizations had hoped to persuade the rebel forces to open up a safe corridor and let those of the 170,000 refugees near Kisangani who were strong enough walk back to Rwanda, stopping at way stations. The matter was complicated by the presence among the refugees of thousands of ex-government troops and Hutu militia members who had carried out the 1994 genocide in Rwanda of up to a million Tutsis and moderate Hutus.
Since the ADFL draws some of its support from local Zairian Tutsis and reputedly from Rwanda as well, it has been deeply suspicious of male refugees of a certain age, a stance that was only hardened when the Zairian government began arming the Hutu militiamen to fight against the rebels. The ADFL initially refused to allow organized refugee camps to be set up in areas under its control, or to permit refugees to approach or pass through Kisangani, ostensibly "for security reasons."
As a result, tens of thousands of refugees were almost constantly on the move in dense forest, beyond the reach of humanitarian assistance. As they became increasingly exhausted, many succumbed to hunger and disease. With greater tension in Kinshasa itself, relief officials fear that the trickle of refugees across the river into Congo may swell into yet another flood. The threat of major conflict in the capital mounted as Mr. Mobutu declared a state of emergency on 8 April, while supporters of long-time opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi organized street protests and strikes to press for Mr. Mobutu's resignation.
Searching for a political solution
Already working hard to contain the regional repercussions of the conflicts in Rwanda and Burundi, the UN and other international actors began searching for a political solution to the Zairian crisis. The UN and OAU named Mr. Sahnoun in January as their joint Special Representative for the Great Lakes region, while African governments also urged negotiations.
These efforts achieved a breakthrough at the OAU Central Organ summit meeting in Lomé in late March, at which both the Zairian government and the ADFL agreed for the first time to open the direct talks in South Africa.
UN Secretary-General Annan, who attended the Lomé summit, noted that both sides had agreed "on the principle" of a ceasefire and negotiations, based on a five-point peace plan that was earlier proposed by Mr. Sahnoun and adopted by the UN Security Council on 18 February. The plan called for an immediate cessation of hostilities, withdrawal of all external forces, including mercenaries, and reaffirmation of respect for the national sovereignty and territorial integrity of Zaire and other states in the Great Lakes region. It also urged protection and security for all refugees and displaced persons, as well as the rapid and peaceful settlement of the crisis in the region through dialogue, electoral processes and the convening of an international conference on peace, security and development in the Great Lakes region.
In anticipation of a political agreement among the Zairian protagonists, the UN has made contingency plans towards monitoring a ceasefire and implementation of a peace plan, Mr. Annan informed the Lomé summit. Senior UN officials later advised the Security Council that up to 200 liaison officers could be dispatched to Zaire within two weeks of an agreement, in advance of a full-scale mission of 1,500-1,600 troops and logistical support.
The bulk of such forces would likely come from African countries, given the limited interest expressed by the larger industrial powers. "Should such a monitoring mechanism be established," the UN Secretary-General told the Lomé meeting, "African states and the OAU will have to play an important part in it."
In November 1996, several donor countries had planned to send troops to Zaire to assist the Rwandese refugees, and the US and Canada actually sent small advance logistical units. But plans for more extensive external military involvement were abandoned after the Zairian rebels attacked the refugee camps. This caused the Hutu political leaders, soldiers and militia to flee deeper into Zaire, enabling the return to Rwanda of more than a million of the refugees. Mr. Annan then proposed in February that the international community "study the possibility of using troops to create humanitarian corridors to evacuate the refugees" from eastern Zaire, but the Security Council did not to take up the suggestion.
Human rights concerns
Well aware of earlier atrocities against civilians in the Great Lakes region, relief personnel have from the outset sought to expose violations by Zairian government troops, Hutu militiamen and ADFL forces.
In March, the US-based Human Rights Watch, in letters to the UN, US government and European Union, cited reports of killings of unarmed civilians in eastern Zaire by members of the ADFL and by Hutu militiamen and soldiers. "The failure to investigate ac cusations of large-scale killings of civilians and to hold authorities responsible for such abuses will only perpetuate the impunity that has encouraged continuing violence in this region," the organization warned. That same month, the International Co mmittee of the Red Cross expressed concern not only over the ADFL's hampering of access to Rwandese refugees, but also the "large numbers" of people arrested in Kisangani following its capture by the ADFL. Mr. Roberto Garreton, the UN Special Rapporteu r for Human Rights in Zaire, following a visit to eastern Zaire, has called for a UN Commission of Inquiry to investigate reports of massacres by ADFL forces, as well as other human rights violations.
At the Lomé meeting, Secretary-General Annan also urged that atrocities be investigated. "We must keep human rights issues at the forefront of our consideration," he said.