AFRICANEWS
Views and news on peace, justice and reconciliation in Africa
July 2001
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War and Peace
BURUNDIPresident Pierre Buyoya, who returned to Burundi on 12 July said the decision to appoint him as first leader of the transition was an "important step towards implementation of the peace agreement". Speaking on arrival from the OAU summit in Lusaka, he said the decision had been made by the peace mediator Nelson Mandela after extensive consultations with regional heads of state and the signatories of the Arusha peace accord. "We also believe that this step will open a new way, and instil more vigour into the search for a solution to the other pending problems, especially that of a ceasefire," Buyoya said, according to Burundi radio. "As you know, some people were claiming that a solution to the [ceasefire] issue could not be found, because the issue of transitional leadership had not been resolved. Therefore, I believe that all that is now out of the way."COTE D'IVOIRESome 500 demonstrators massed outside the Belgian Embassy in Abidjan on 13 July denouncing a Belgian NGO that filed suit in court, on behalf of Ivorian victims of human rights, against ousted military strongman General Robert Guei, President Laurent Gbagbo and two serving ministers.The protesters, grouped under an NGO umbrella called the Collective for the Restoration of the Image of Cote d'Ivoire, told the Belgium government to keep out of what they said was an international campaign to destabilise their country. Charles Ble Goude, spokesman for the protesters handed a "letter of indignation and protest" to the embassy's first secretary, William De Baetes. In a statement later, the embassy said Brussels was powerless to intervene in matters already in the courts. Some 150 rights victims - with the help of the Belgian NGO Prevention Genocides - filed the suit against Gbagbo, Guei and the ministers of the interior and civil protection Emile Boga Doudou and Moise Lida Kouassi. Under Belgian law the country's courts can judge foreign leaders for human rights violations. ETHIOPIAThe first group of seventy university students from Ethiopia left Nairobi on Friday evening to begin their stay at a refugee camp in northern Kenya. Speaking to CISA outside the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) offices in Nairobi shortly before their departure, the students said they eventually agreed to go to Kakuma Refugee Camp in northern Kenya because "we have no choice." They said the Government of Kenya had instructed them to leave Nairobi.Other reliable sources told CISA that the students were assured of their security in Kakuma by the Kenyan authorities and the UNHCR, and that negotiations with the refugee agency would continue even after they go to the camp. That is why they broke their hunger strike outside the UNHCR offices on June 29th after five days. A team of their representatives will be returning to Nairobi next week to keep up negotiations with UNHCR. The students fled to Kenya after being harassed by the Ethiopian administration in their campuses. They demanded academic freedom. Their protests there were met with brutal force in Addis Ababa, leaving at least forty of them dead. As they leave for Kakuma, they still fear that Ethiopia might have planted spies in Kenya, even in the camps, masquerading as refugees. Those belonging to the Oromo ethnic group say they will still not feel secure among other non-Oromo Ethiopians even in Kakuma. The Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) fights against the government forces in a bid to secede. It is for this reason, the students told CISA, that the Oromos among them are more targeted by the Ethiopian government and are insecure. In all, about 200 students are already in Kenya. (CISA) RWANDARwanda has hailed the arrest of more genocide suspects in three European countries. On 12 July, three suspects - including a former minister - were arrested in Belgium, Switzerland and the Netherlands. Rwandan Justice Minister Jean de Dieu Mucyo called on the entire world to cooperate with the Arusha-based International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), the Rwanda News Agency (RNA) reported. "Given the cooperation of all countries, genocide perpetrators can be detained, therefore eliminating the culture of impunity," the minister said. The three suspects - arrested on an international warrant by ICTR chief prosecutor Carla del Ponte - are former finance minister in the 1994 interim government Emmanuel Ndindabahizi who was arrested in Brussels; Emmanuel Rukundo a former military chaplain who was arrested in Geneva; and Simon Bikindi a Rwandan musician who was arrested in the Netherlands.SIERRA LEONEUNAMSIL human rights officers visited Makeni, eastern Sierra Leone, on 13 July to investigate RUF charges by the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) that it is being attacked in the east by rival militiamen of the Civil Defence Forces (CDF), the UN Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) reported.Investigators interviewed villagers in Masofinia, Yaraiya and Worodu in the districts of Koinadugu and Kono. UNAMSIL reported that 13 wounded persons from Yaraiya were admitted to the African Islamic Hospital in Makeni. Mutual suspicion about the true intentions of the protagonists has slowed down the disarmament process in Kono District, unlike a similar process in May in Kambia and Port Loko districts which was completed quickly. UNAMSIL spokeswoman Margaret Novicki told IRIN that the third tripartite meeting of UNAMSIL, the government and RUF on disarmament was due on 10 July, in the southern town of Bo. Meanwhile, 135 CDF ex-fighters who had been at the disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration camp in the eastern town of Daru since 29 May were discharged on 6 July. UNAMSIL reported that 87 left on their own by road for Koidu, some 74 km to the north. UNAMSIL flew another 48 to the town of Koidu. As they left they sang, "Ex-combatants, we are ready for peace, we are no longer going to hold guns."
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