BUSH VISITS RWANDA: President Bush backs UN sanctions against FDLR

KIGALI - United States President George Walker Bush has said his government fully supports the UN sanctions against the genocidaires, so-called Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), who are holed up in the DR Congo.  He was responding to a question from a journalist who sought to know what he, after visiting the Kigali Genocide Memorial, and his government would do to help Rwanda stem off the perpetrators’ effort to return to the country to complete their mission. 

Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Presidents Bush and Kagame addressing a press conference at Village Urugwiro yesterday. (PPU photo)

KIGALI - United States President George Walker Bush has said his government fully supports the UN sanctions against the genocidaires, so-called Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), who are holed up in the DR Congo.  He was responding to a question from a journalist who sought to know what he, after visiting the Kigali Genocide Memorial, and his government would do to help Rwanda stem off the perpetrators’ effort to return to the country to complete their mission. 

"We support the UN Security Council resolutions targeting those who are perpetrators and we have our position publicly known and we shall continue to support it.” 

He said this yesterday at a press conference he jointly held with his host, President Paul Kagame at the latter’s office at Village Urugwiro.  He said that US government has helped to broker two agreements between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) government as well as peace agreements between the Congo government and several armed groups.

"Now we have got to move forward. It is one thing to agree on something but it is important to get results for the agreements,” Bush emphasized.  

FDLR, which was blacklisted by the US as a terrorist organization and branded a negative group by a regional four-nation political forum, the Joint Tripartite Plus Commission, is also blamed for massacres of thousands of civilians in DRC, Burundi and Uganda. These three together with Rwanda compose the JTPC.
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