Rwanda faults UN figures on demobilised FDLR militia

The Rwanda Demobilisation and Reintegration Commission (RDRC) has dismissed as ‘inflated’ figures given by the U.N. mission in the DR Congo, MONUSCO of known FDLR militias who surrendered and returned home this year. While the RDRC registered a total 190 ex-FDLR militia fighters who returned home last year, at a year-end news conference, the head of MONUSCO’s disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (or DDR) section, Taz Greyling, reported that from the start of the year up to December, 710 FDLR members have been disarmed and demobilised, including 315 children. But in an interview yesterday, RDRC chairperson, John Sayinzoga, said, “That’s impossible. Where exactly did they [MONUSCO] send them?” Sayinzoga explained that a total of 190 people returned in four phases of demobilisation and reintegration this year. “There were 50 and 52 FDLR fighters in the 53rd and 54th phases early this year, followed by 44 others one after the other in the 55th and 56th phases,” Sayinzoga said. The militia remnants of the masterminds of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi operate in eastern DR Congo from where they continue to nurse genocide ideology. According to Sayinzoga, MONUSCO could be confusing the real FDLR elements with Rwandan refugee civilians as well as Congolese civilians recruited into the militia ranks. “When all these pass through their transit centres and they are registered in their manifests, they then announce that they have sent them to Rwanda and that they are all ex-FDLR.” Meanwhile, the Ministry of Disaster Management and Refugee Affairs (MIDMAR) says a total 5, 081 Rwandans – civilians – returned from the DR Congo this year. Of these, 3, 939 came in through the Rubavu-Goma border crossing while 1, 142 arrived through the Rusizi-Kamembe border. In March 2013, the UN Security Council adopted resolution 2098 to disarm the FDLR, but MONUSCO has never shown any genuine will to make a move against the militia. In March 2014, Amb. Eugène-Richard Gasana, Rwanda’s Permanent Representative to the UN, told the Council that militia’s strength was estimated at 3,640 with infantry integral weapons and that their strength was then “likely to increase due to ongoing recruitment and training.” Gasana said the militia was, at the time, engaged in various activities, including beefing up collaboration with regular Congolese army units at operation level. The UN Force Intervention Brigade (FIB), a military formation under MONUSCO and then commanded by Tanzanian General, James Mwakibolwa, in 2013 crushed the M23 rebellion in four days but remains reluctant to attack FDLR. Throughout the last quarter of 2013, Kigali was told that FDLR would be next on the list of negative forces to be eliminated. That has not happened. On Tuesday, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon announced the appointment of Lt. Gen. Derick Mbuyiselo Mgwebi of South Africa as Force Commander of MONUSCO. He succeeds Brazilian, Lt. Gen. Carlos Alberto dos Santos Cruz who completed his assignment on December 2.

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Rwanda faults UN figures on demobilised FDLR militia