South Kivu - War and Human Rights Situation

War and Human Rights Situation

The Banyamulenge, the term historically describing the ethnic Tutsi Rwandans (Banyarwanda) concentrated on the Itombwe Plateau of the province, have been the focus of much controversy. The ambiguous political and social position of the Banyamulenge has been a point of contention in the province, in the wake of incursion by fleeing Interahamwe forces responsible for the genocide of Rwandan Tutsis into the Kivu region after the liberation of neighboring Rwanda by the Tutsi-led RPF, leading to the Banyamulenge playing a key role in the run-up to the First Congo War in 1996-7 and Second Congo War of 1998-2003.

South Kivu, along with North Kivu, has been the center of the conflict resulting from the Second Congo War. The UN estimates that in 2005, approximately 45,000 women were raped in South Kivu. It forms the new Congolese military (FARDC's) 10th Military Region, under General Pacifique Masunzu, whose undisciplined former factional fighters are responsible for many continuing human rights abuses, due to a continuing culture of impunity for military personnel, bad conditions, lack of pay, and lack of training.

Masunzu is a Banyamulenge (South Kivu Banyamulenge Tutsi) who broke with the Rwandan-backed Rally for Congolese Democracy (RCD) back in 2003. He was formerly commander of the 122nd Brigade in the Minembwe area, who in 2005 rebelled against the authorities in defence of the Congolese Banyamulenge, against harassment and physical abuse. Also previously former second in command of 4th Military Region in Kasai-Occidental. Africa Confidential said in 2011 that he 'clearly remains implacably opposed to the Rwandan government.' His deputy Colonel Baudouin Nakabaka is a former Mai-Mai fighter with close links to the FDLR.

In July 2007, United Nations human rights expert Yakin Erturk called the situation in South Kivu the worst she has ever seen in four years as the global body's special investigator for violence against women. Sexual violence throughout Congo is "rampant," she said, blaming rebel groups, the armed forces and national police. Her statement included that "Frequently women are shot or stabbed in their genital organs, after they are raped. Women, who survived months of enslavement, told me that their tormentors had forced them to eat excrement or the human flesh of murdered relatives."