DRC troops ‘in rapes and murders’

Margot Wallstrom visited the Democratic Republic of Congo last week to hear first hand testimony from witnesses and victims of abuses

A UN envoy says some government troops in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have committed rape and murder.

The UN special representative on sexual violence in conflict, Margot Wallstrom, has been briefing the Security Council on her visit to North Kivu province.

She said the abuses were happening in the same area where rebels committed mass rapes in July and August.

UN peacekeepers based just 20 miles (32km) away were criticised at the time for not responding quickly enough.

Around 300 civilians and more than 50 children in the Walikale region were raped by the rebels – many of them in front of their families and neighbours.

Ms Wallstrom blamed the rebel Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) and Mai-Mai militia.

The attacks had focussed international attention on the endemic sexual violence in Congo and UN failures to deal with it.

Since then, Ms Wallstrom said government troops (FARDC) had been deployed to the territory to reassert control and to implement the president’s moratorium on mining in the area, which is rich in minerals.

The UN special representative heard directly from locals on her visit last week and said UN peacekeepers in the area had also told her of rapes, killings and lootings perpetrated recently by government soldiers.

She urged the DRC government to investigate the new attacks and “swiftly hold any perpetrators to account”.

“The possibility that the same communities that were brutalised in July and August are now also suffering exactions at the hands of the FARDC troops is unimaginable and unacceptable,” she said.

The BBC’s United Nations correspondent, Barbara Plett, says Ms Wallstrom’s warning underlines the enormous difficulty of protecting civilians in a region overrun by rebel groups, with an army made up of former militias.

The UN Security Council also heard a call for sanctions against a Rwandan Hutu commander known as “Colonel Serafim” who the special representative says is among those responsible for the July and August attacks.

Ms Wallstrom welcomed the recent arrests of two rebel leaders, saying this should serve as a warning that sexual violence would not be tolerated.

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