PRESS CONFERENCE BY RWANDA

The insecurity emanating from the Democratic Republic of the Congo was the main reason Rwanda had intervened in that country, Patrick Mazimpaka, Special Envoy of the President of Rwanda in charge of the Great Lakes region, told correspondents at a Headquarters press conference today.

Rwandan soldiers and militias who had fled their country after the genocide of 1994 had continued their programme of killing and destabilization from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), he continued.  Successive governments in the DRC had supported those forces, in spite of his country's appeals and Security Council resolutions since 1995.  Those resolutions had called on Member States to desist from assisting and supplying arms to the armed groups who committed crimes in the region.

Today, those forces numbered 55,000.  A recent report commissioned by the Security Council, at the request of the DRC Government, was misleading, because that report only covered the eastern part of the DRC, where they had found

12,000 to 15,000 troops.  It did not, however, report on those who had integrated and operated with the DRC Government in other areas.  Those forces –- numbering 40,000 -- continued to be a source of insecurity and concern to Rwanda and a source of destabilization for the DRC as a whole.

The Lusaka Agreement had provided for disarmament, demobilization, repatriation and reintegration of those forces.  The Security Council had, however, not provided a force to disarm the groups and had only sent observers. The forces had no reason to disarm voluntarily, as had been suggested by the Council, because they were supplied by the DRC Government and had support from other places.

The recent Security Council mission to the region had proposed that a "curtain" be established in eastern Congo, within reach of forces from Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi, who would, in tandem with Government forces in place, work together in a disarmament process supervised by the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC). There were, however, some pre-conditions for that plan to work.

First, the resources through which the groups were able to arm themselves must be cut off, he said.  Kishasha must also have the political will to dismantle those forces' headquarters and bases.  That was why his country had asked the Security Council to include in the new mandate for MONUC a provision that that Mission would begin the disarmament process.

The inter-Congolese dialogue had a major contribution to make, he said.  A successful completion of that dialogue, in the context of the Lusaka Agreement, would provide the Congolese Government with an opportunity to change its policies towards its neighbors.  He was, therefore, encouraged by the statement of the Security Council supporting an inclusive dialogue.

In response to questions, he said his Government did not employ mercenaries. There were no mercenaries in the Congo, unless one considered the forces he had referred to earlier as mercenaries of the Congolese Government.

Regarding the recent mutiny in Kisangani, he said that area was administered by the Congolese Rally for Democracy.  The mutineers had stated that they had taken the town of Kisangani to hand it over to the Government of the DRC.  They had also called on the population to carry out a massacre of Rwandans, or of people who looked like Rwandans.

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