UN experts say Rwanda and Uganda backing DR Congo

UNITED NATIONS — A UN expert panel accused Rwanda's defense minister of being the "de facto" commander of a rebellion in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, according to a confidential report seen by AFP. The report accused both Rwanda and Uganda of arming and supporting the M23 rebels, whose members are former fighters in an ethnic Tutsi rebel movement theoretically integrated into the Congolese military under a 2009 peace deal. This is not the first time the two central African nations have been accused of backing rebels in a proxy war in eastern Congo, allegations they have consistently denied. In June, in an interim report, the same UN panel said it had "overwhelming evidence" that senior Rwandan Defense Forces officers "have been backstopping the rebels through providing weapons, military supplies, and new recruits." In the updated, more detailed report, the experts -- who are tasked with monitoring the implementation of UN sanctions in Congo -- said they have "found no substantive element of its previous finding which it wishes to alter." The report alleged that the M23 "de facto chain of command includes General Bosco Ntaganda and culminates with the Rwandan minister of Defense, General James Kabarebe." The renegade general Ntaganda is wanted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court. The report said the government of Rwanda continues to violate the arms embargo through direct military support to M23 rebels, encouraging Congolese soldiers to desert, and providing arms, intelligence and political advice. And in Uganda, senior officials gave support "in the form of direct troop reinforcements in DRC territory, weapons deliveries, technical assistance, joint planning, political advice and facilitation of external relations." The report said Ugandan and Rwandan military units jointly supported M23 in a series of attacks in July 2012 to take over the major towns of Rutshuru territory and a Congolese military base, Rumangabo. During the July clashes, a UN peacekeeper from India was killed. According to the experts, "the rebels expanded their control over Rutshuru territory with extensive foreign support in July 2012 and have recently taken advantage of an informal ceasefire to enhance alliances and command proxy operations elsewhere." They added that "the use and recruitment of child soldiers by armed groups, notably by M23, has increased," with "the enrollment and training of hundreds of young boys and girls" and "certain M23 commanders have ordered the extra-judicial executions of dozens of recruits and prisoners of war." Both Rwanda and Uganda have again denied strenuously that they support the M23 rebellion. Rwandan foreign minister Louise Mushikiwabo accused the authors of the report of mounting a "determined political campaign opposed to resolving true causes of conflict" in the Congo. Her Ugandan counterpart, Henry Okello Oryem, called the report "a joke" and called on the experts to produce their evidence. He told AFP Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni will continue mediation efforts in the region, saying leaders there would give no credit to UN report. The M23 rebel fighters were incorporated into the DR Congo army in 2009 as part of a peace deal in the troubled, mineral-rich eastern region. They quit the army this year in a dispute over salaries and poor conditions.

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