DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO: Rebel FDLR commander hands himself in to the United Nations mission in the DRC

Record ID: 783486

  • Title: DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO: Rebel FDLR commander hands himself in to the United Nations mission in the DRC
  • Date: 18th February 2011
  • Summary: GOMA, DR CONGO (FILE) (ORIGINALLY IN 4:3) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF MOUNTAIN LANDSCAPE VARIOUS OF UNITED NATIONS (UN) TROOPS PATROLLING AREA
  • Embargoed: 5th March 2011 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Congo, The Democratic Republic of the
  • Country: Congo, Democratic Republic of
  • Topics: Crime / Law Enforcement
  • Reuters ID: LVA33GB868PWFWOTN7V2WBOV8ZQF
  • Story Text: In Goma, a town in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, near the border with Rwanda, locals are used to seeing UN soldiers patrolling the hills.
    Brutal fighting between Congolese troops and the Rwandan rebel group the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) has long terrorised the community.
    On-off fighting over the last two decades has seen hundreds of civilians killed and injured and may homes destroyed. Rape is a common weapon used by the rebel gangs and both men and women in the region have been subjected to sexual violence.
    As part of the effort to resolve the stand-off between the rebels and government troops, the United Nations mission in the DR Congo (MONUSCO) has been running a program to persuade rebel soldiers and their leaders to turn themselves in.
    Four senior rebel leaders have handed themselves in over the last month. The latest and most high ranking is Lieutenant-Colonel Samuel Bisengimana, a senior commander with the FDLR who turned himself over to MONUSCO on Wednesday (February 16).
    In an interview during his repatriation to Rwanda, he said friends and family back home in Rwanda had persuaded him to do it.
    "I'm personally convinced by the United Nations DDRRR Program, by friends who are already in Rwanda and by friends from everywhere including my family members. I had enough time to all these people to ask them what is going on and would happen to me if I continued staying in the bush," he said.
    After more than a year of negotiations, MONUSCO's Disarmament, Demobilization, Reintegration, Repatriation and Repatriation (DDRRR) programme extracted the FDLR leader, also known Sam-Kunda Mutima, from Ntoto territory in Walikale, eastern DRC.
    According to MONUSCO, Bisengimana was responsible for mobilizing civilian support for the FDLR and also facilitated recruitment.
    Before joining the FDLR, Bisengimana was a member of the former Rwandan Armed Forces responsible of the genocide against Tutsis in 1994.
    When asked about the sexual violence committed by FDLR soldiers against civilians, Bisengimana said it was something he couldn't condone.
    "If there are some FDLR people who committed such crimes (like rapes), I condemn them," he said.
    Last year, 1,881 FDLR members, including 64 officers, opted for voluntary surrender and disarmament under the MONUSCO demobilization programme.
    MONUSCO's DDRRR expert Walimba Mass said the scheme was proving to be a big success.
    "Since 2009, we have already repatriated 4054 ex-combatants, among them 117 officers. So you can see the level at which the FDLR has been affected," he said.
    Bisengimana is now being repatriated to a camp for demobilized soldiers in Mutobo, north-western Rwanda.
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