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104 Killed, 75,000 Displaced in Ankoro, Katanga Province

UN Integrated Regional Information Networks
NEWS
November 22, 2002
Posted to the web November 22, 2002
Kinshasa
An estimated 104 civilians were killed and 75,000 displaced during recent
fighting between government troops and Mayi-Mayi militias in the town of
Ankoro, in northern Katanga Province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
(DRC).
Abbot Francois Mwila Bweno, who is in hiding in the southeastern city of
Lubumbashi, said the fighting erupted when government forces began burning and
pillaging homes and shops in the area. A local human rights NGO, the Commission
de Vulgarisation des Droits de l'Homme et de Developpement (CVDHO), reported
that this began on 10 November.
Bweno said that the soldiers began their reprisal on Sunday against local Mayi-
Mayi fighters who had beat up a soldier.
"It has been a chain of settling of accounts with the other, as the Mayi-Mayi
sought revenge for one of their own who had been beat up on Saturday by
soldiers [of the FAC] who tried to take away his weapon," said Mwila.
Abbot Leon Simbi of the Saint Antoine parish in Ankoro said the human toll has
been particularly brutal.
"Some were burned, and the soldiers threw some bodies in the river to try and
hide the evidence," Simbi said from a hideout in Lubumbashi.
The Lubumbashi-based CVDHO reported at least 1,200 homes were burned on 15
November, with 29 corpses left in the rubble, while others were thrown in the
Congo River. It added that a warehouse storing food for internally displaced
persons was also looted and destroyed.
The United Nations Mission in the DRC confirmed that there were skirmishes in
Ankoro, but did not give any details. The government also refused to comment.
The priests and journalists who have published information on the events have
complained that they have been pursued by DRC security service agents, forcing
them into hiding.
"The security services have taken another abbot, whose name is also Francois,"
Simbi said.

   

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