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November 29, 2008

UN Envoy in Eastern Congo in Bid to End Conflict
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Olusegun Obasanjo was to meet Saturday with rebel leader Laurent Nkunda
in rebel-held town of Jomba in volatile North Kivu province 
A special U.N. envoy was in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo
Saturday as part of a new bid to end the civil war in eastern Congo.
Former Nigerian President and UN special envoy to Democratic Republic of
Congo (DRC) Olusegun Obasanjo (file photo)Olusegun Obasanjo was to meet
Saturday with rebel leader Laurent Nkunda in the rebel-held town of
Jomba in volatile North Kivu province. Mr. Obasanjo, a former Nigerian
president, met Friday with Congolese President Joseph Kabila in the
capital, Kinshasa. The meetings come as rebels have advanced amid
renewed fighting and a crumbling cease-fire in the east. U.N. officials
Friday confirmed that Nkunda's forces have seized the town of Ishasha,
near the Ugandan border, and some 13,000 refugees have fled into Uganda
over the last few days to escape the fighting. Nkunda's forces have
denied violating a cease-fire agreement. They say their actions are
targeted at Rwandan Hutu rebels, and not Congolese forces. Mr.
Obasanjo's also met with Mr. Kabila and Nkunda in a trip to the DRC
earlier this month. In related news, the top U.N. human rights official
is calling for urgent action to stop killing, rape and other abuses
being committed by government and rebel forces in eastern Congo. Human
Rights High Commissioner Navi Pillay urged diplomats meeting in Vienna
to make sure the U.N. mission in Congo gets the political backing it
needs to respond to the crisis. At the same meeting, the European Union
told the U.N. Human Rights Council there is clear evidence that war
crimes and crimes against humanity have been committed by both sides in
the DRC. It cited widespread cases of rape, summary execution, torture,
and the recruitment and use of child soldiers by the warring factions.
The U.N. Security Council this week approved a request to send
three-thousand more peacekeepers to Congo to join the 17,000 already
there. But officials say it could be months before the troops are
deployed.

Some information for this report was provided by AP and Reuters.


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