Gboyega Akinsanmi with agency reports
17 November 2008
Lagos — Former President Olusegun Obasanjo yesterday held a peace meeting with Democratic Republic of Congo's rebel leader, Laurent Nkunda, seeking an end to armed hostilities between the government troops and rebels.
In what has been described as a major breakthrough, the Congolese rebel leader pledged to throw his weight behind the United Nations (UN) peace process on conditions that the government troops cease hostilities with the rebel group.
Earlier Saturday, Obasanjo held talks with Congolese President Joseph Kabila, demanding that the fighting in North Kivu be prevented from escalating into a repeat of a wider 1998-2003 Congo war that sucked in six neighbouring states.
Obasanjo, who met with Nkunda at his home village in the foothills of the Virunga Mountains close to the Rwanda and Uganda borders, said the talks went well. The former president is a special UN envoy to DR Congo.
After talks with Obasanjo at Jomba in DR Congo, North Kivu province, Nkunda said he had agreed to three requests from him to respect a ceasefire, open a humanitarian corridor and support the UN peace initiative.
According to Obasanjo, Nkunda wants to maintain a ceasefire, but it is like dancing the tango. You can not do it alone. He agrees to supports a United Nations peace process for Eastern Congo including respecting a ceasefire and creating a humanitarian corridor to aid refugees
"We agree," Nkunda said in French, but he had asked Obasanjo to tell President Joseph Kabila's government to also respect a suspension of military hostilities.
Nkunda said: "We support his mission. He has got support from the international community. We are behind him and we are going to do our part so we can get on with this peace.
Weeks of combat between Nkunda's Tutsi rebels and government troops and their militia allies have displaced around a quarter of a million civilians, creating what aid agencies call a "catastrophic" humanitarian situation in east Congo.
Earlier, UN peacekeepers reported heavy artillery, rocket and small arms fire near the village of Ndeko, about 110 km north of Goma, the capital of North Kivu province. Nkunda played down the latest clash, saying it was "not a problem" and he had contacted the government to try to end it.
UN military spokesman, Lt-Col Jean-Paul Dietrich, said: "It is difficult to say who started it but we can confirm it was between the CNDP and the army. We treated six army soldiers who were wounded and need to be evacuated".
The roots of the North Kivu conflict stem from Rwanda's 1994 genocide, when extremist Hutu militias killed about 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus before fleeing into Congo.
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The problem of Congo can be solved by the will of the Government of Congo by accepting direct talks with rebels. Internal conflicts can never be solved by gun or by foreigners. If Congo think that Military Intervention by Angola will solve the conflict, it will rather worsen the situation because other foreign forces will also intervene to rescue the Minority Tutsi from Genocide.
ncungujohn, as far as we are all aware there is no such genocide against the minority Tutsi in the Congo. Since the war ended in 2003, can you tell me of anything that suggests that the minority Tutsi have been killed. There isn't. These are all pretextes.
To me, maybe Kigali should work hand in hand with Kinshasa to see how to solve their common interest. They could form a force together to eradicate all negative forces in their common region. If any of the two is not willing to do so, then we can question their motives for not… [Read Full Text]
Obasanjo again!!! Laurent Nkunda, you have to be very very careful of Obasanjo. Remember this man and the former president of Liberia, Mr. Charles Taylor story. Obasanjo came to Liberia about fifty times during the Liberia war and persuaded Mr Taylor to leave Liberia to seek refuge in Nigeria for the sake of peace, but Mr. Obasanjo betrayed the trust and disgrace Mr. Taylor by turning him over to the UN for prosecution. If you are not careful, you will see yourself in handcuffs and be taken to the Netherlands for prosecution like Charles Taylor. He was successful in betraying… [Read Full Text]
The Hague is precisely where Nkunda belongs because of all war crimes he's commited. If Obassanjo can help speed up this process, Congo will be grateful to him.
How many battalions does Obasanjo have?
Regards.
I am not convinced because we've heard and seen this before. After six to 12 months he will start again.
The solution is for Nkunda to disarm and integrate. So long as he does not want to integrate, then this is simply a waiting game. Angola should go ahead with deploying its troops in that region. The border control of that region should be monitored by Angola and other SADC forces