Rwanda’s Foreign minister, Louise Mushikiwabo, yesterday, expressed disappointment that the UN Group of Experts on the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has continued to engage in a determined political campaign to tarnish Rwanda. In the latest development, the Group of Experts, this week, leaked another report to the media with allegations that Rwanda and Uganda are supporting the M23, a military rebellion in the neighbouring DRC.Uganda is heading regional efforts involving 11 countries to seek a solution to the crisis. Felix Kulayigye, Uganda’s military spokesperson, rubbished the report."Where’s the evidence for their claims? Some of those so-called experts came here and did not interview anyone,” Kulayigye said. "Where’s their authentic facts to back those claims? Those accusations are absolute rubbish, hogwash.”Minister Mushikiwabo pointed out that "the leak of the final report of the Group of Experts confirms what Rwanda has maintained ever since Hege’s incendiary anti-Rwanda writings came to our attention: he is pursuing a political agenda that has nothing to do with getting at the true causes of conflict in the eastern DRC.”Mushikiwabo observed that any effort to engage constructively with Hege has been twisted out of context and used against Rwanda."Rwanda will not allow itself to be dragged any deeper into this farce by responding to the Group’s far-fetched but fact-free assertions.”Minister Mushikiwabo added that Rwanda is focused on engaging with other countries of the region, including the DRC, to bring about a lasting solution to the crisis – a peace process that has already led to a two- month cease-fire."We are fully committed to the ongoing ICGLR process – the problems in DRC didn’t emerge overnight and can’t be fixed overnight, but there is a strong belief that a regional solution is not only the best way forward – it is the only way forward.”The credibility of the Experts received a further dent after it emerged that they asked to visit Rwanda for input on its final report, the day after it had been submitted to the Security Council.Olivier Nduhungirehe, the First Counsellor, Permanent Mission of Rwanda to the UN, said that the actions of the experts was beyond disdain."This really is the final insult by Steven Hege and his colleagues.  The Group of Experts issues its final report to the Sanctions Committee on Friday October 12, while offering to hear what Rwanda has to say about it on Saturday October 13,” Nduhungirehe said.A DC-based law firm, Akin Gump, agrees with Rwanda’s assessment that the UN Group of Experts has abused its powers in the course of pinning blame on Kigali for the DRC conflict. Among other shortcomings, the law firm found that the Group of Experts were guilty of "[a] lack of transparency, the reliance on questionable sources and the complete lack of analysis of witness bias, motivation, or contradictory evidence.”In an exclusive interview published in the Metro-US, yesterday, Foreign Minister, Louise Mushikiwabo said that the expert panel has been "hijacked” by the political agenda of its coordinator, Steven Hege, who has a long history of opposition to the Rwandan government. FULL INTERVIEWMetro: You have vigorously criticized not only the U.N. reports compiled by the Group of Experts accusing Rwanda of supporting the M-23 rebel militia in the Democratic Republic of Congo, but also the methodology employed in these reports — and, above all, "bias” on the part of the group’s coordinator.LM: We have endeavored to be objective in our assessment of Mr. Hege. To this end, we employed the Washington, D.C., law firm Akin Gump to review Mr. Hege’s prior writings on Rwanda as well as the genocidal army and militia which killed more than 1 million people in a veritable Holocaust over three summer months in 1994. The fact-based evidence, which was vetted by Akin Gump and submitted to the Security Council, in the case of Hege, is damning in the extreme and should have disqualified him from taking the position as coordinator of the Group of Experts in the first place.

Metro: What has Hege written prior to taking up his position as coordinator?LM: First and foremost, Hege has served as an out-and-out apologist for the remnants of the very genocidal forces who, after committing their genocidal crimes, became known as the FDLR after taking refuge into the eastern DRC when they were chased out of Rwanda in 1994.

Hege characterizes the FDLR militia, whose leaders are either under indictment at the International Criminal Court at the Hague or on trial in Germany, as if its members are somehow victims, and not perpetrators, of mass atrocities. In this "fact sheet” written in 2009 and entitled "Understanding the FDLR,” Hege also described, falsely, the current Rwandan government as made up of illegitimate outsiders, a "Ugandan Tutsi elite,” and that peace in our region is only possible "when international opinion eventually sours on the Rwandan regime.” 

With this objective in mind, Hege’s hatchet job, on the platform which the UN report has accorded him, becomes frighteningly clear. The reports which he and the Group of Experts have submitted to the UN Sanctions Committee wouldn’t pass muster in the lowest imaginable court of law. As Akin Gump concluded, "The lack of transparency, the reliance on questionable sources and the complete lack of analysis of witness bias, motivation or contradictory evidence in the conclusions reached [make] those conclusions highly unreliable.”Metro: Are you saying Mr. Hege isn’t entitled to his point of view?LM: Of course, Mr. Hege is entitled to his views as a private citizen. But his extremist views are now well known in Africa because of the platform he has been given by the United Nations. Referencing Hege’s call, in a 2010 issues paper, for ethnic minority groups to preference their economic and other interests in favor of the majority population, regardless of circumstance; according to perhaps the leading newspaper in East Africa, Hege’s writing that certain ethnic groups "must clear a higher bar of citizenship is central to racial ideology everywhere, whether in the form of anti-Semitism of the persecution of Japanese Americans in World War II.” Hege knows that he is exposed on the matter of his prior writings. When this publication was discovered by the media in July, Hege pulled it from the Internet.I want to put the entire matter with Hege into its proper perspective. Yes, the methodology employed by the Group of Experts is wholly flawed. But, above all, what we have here is the moral disgrace committed in the name of the U.N. A sympathizer or, more accurately, apologist of genocide perpetrators has been put in a position to sit in judgment of the victims, the Rwandan people. Metro: Are you suggesting a bigger U.N.?problem here?LM: Yes, I am. It is clear that the U.N. process for the appointment and vetting of "experts” is broken and in desperate need of repair. The failed expert selection on Congo, which has somehow turned into an indictment of Rwanda, is but one of a number of recent miscarriages of justice of the same kind hurting African countries, including expert panels on Cote d’Ivoire and Somalia-Eritrea. The time has now come for the international community to know about the treatment being meted out to powerless countries like Rwanda through unjust, outdated and punitive international mechanisms such as the U.N. Group of Experts when it falls into the hands of individuals with a personal political agenda. Metro: What is the status of the conflict in the eastern Congo?LM: Eleven countries of the region, including Rwanda and the DRC, are joining forces to bring about a lasting solution to the crisis. This includes deploying a neutral force to monitor the borders between the eastern DRC and its neighbors.

It also includes a "joint verification mechanism,” which is a way to test the truth or otherwise the many claims and counter-claims that circulate during periods of instability. The regional peace process has led to a two- month cease-fire, and there is overwhelming consensus that the only way out of the mess is a political solution, not a military one. It is a complex part of the world.

There are dozens of armed groups running riot, and the state of governance is weak. The problems didn’t emerge overnight and can’t be fixed overnight, but there is a strong belief that a regional solution is not only the best way forward -- it is the only way forward.Metro Official statementMetro contacted the U.N. for comment. The organization’s official statement is: Until all of Steve Hege’s findings on Rwanda are final and published, the U.N. has no comment on the matter.