Burundi Welcomes Refugees Fleeing DR Congo Violence

http://allafrica.com/stories/201802040087.html

Thousands of refugees have flooded into Burundi to escape a fresh outbreak of fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The UNHCR has praised locals for welcoming their traumatized neighbors.

"It's definitely better here than on the other side of the lake," a Congolese refugee in the Burundian city of Rumonge tells DW, relief clearly visible on his face.

"The Burundians help us, they bring us sweet potato and corn to eat. I'm very grateful for the hospitality."

He fled his homeland in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) after clashes between government forces and rebels flared there last week. According to the UN refugee agency (UNHCR), the violence drove around 8,000 refugees across the border into Burundi within just a few days.

Congo 'state agents' murdered hundreds in 2017, says UN report

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/25/congo-state-agents-murdered-hundreds-in-2017-says-un-report

“State agents” in the Democratic Republic of the Congo carried out 1,176 extrajudicial killings last year, according to a report published by the United Nations mission in the central African country.

The report says at least 89 women and 213 children were among the dead. The number of extrajudicial killings had tripled over the past two years, and Congolese armed forces were responsible for 64% of the total, the UN said.

Hmmmm

In DR Congo, cost of funerals is a crippling burden for the bereaved

https://www.independent.co.ug/dr-congo-cost-funerals-crippling-burden-bereaved/

In Kinshasa, perhaps just one thing beats the cost of living — and that’s the cost of being dead.

Since the start of the year, funerals have become a common sight in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s capital, the tragic outcome of floods, cholera and political violence.

But for many bereaved, the loss of a loved-one also comes with the dread of the astronomical bill — as much as a year’s wages — for saying farewell to them.

The morgue, the wake, the burial, catering for mourners and receiving far-flung relatives… put this lot together, and the bill typically tots up to around $2,500 dollars (2,000 euros)

By way of comparison, a supermarket employee in Kinshasa earns between $100 and $150 a month, while the average civil service wage is about $200 a month.

AU should demand an apology from Kabila. Amen

Four soldiers killed in attack in central Congo: U.N. radio

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-congo-violence/four-soldiers-killed-in-attack-in-central-congo-u-n-radio-idUSKBN1F30Q6

Suspected militia fighters killed four Congolese soldiers in a hit-and-run attack on a military post in troubled Kasai-Central province’s capital, Kananga, U.N.-funded radio reported on Sunday.

Fighting between the Kamuina Nsapu militia and government forces over the past year and a half has displaced over 1 million people in Democratic Republic of Congo’s Kasai provinces. Millions more have been hit by a severe humanitarian crisis.

Hati13:

Hmm.....why?

She was evil for Ethiopia in general, but her deed helped my ethnic groups to size power in Ethiopia after a couple of centuries.

Hmm..... well let's say I'm not the biggest fan of christianity I tend to take a liking to those who practice indigenous 'religions'

Hmm I like her

DR Congo flood tragedy highlights perils of urban slums

http://www.nation.co.ke/news/africa/Landslides-sweep-homes-slums-DR-Congo/1066-4252750-j5eqhx/index.html

The morning light showed a scene of desolation as people in Ngaliema surveyed the wreckage of shanty homes swept away by killer floods and landslides.

Among the 44 people who perished overnight Wednesday in Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, were a teenager, Brunelle, her sister Gladys, and Gladys' baby.

Their home of makeshift yellowish clay bricks, located at the foot of a steep slope literally dissolved after the waters struck, neighbours said.

Growing divisions between east and west Europe set to be 'bigger worry than Brexit' for EU

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/898220/europe-news-eastern-europe-poland-hungary-bigger-worry-than-brexit-news-eu-uk

The growing rifts between east and west Europe look set to plunge the European Union into a fresh crisis in the new year as Poland and Hungary continue to rebel against the bloc’s push for more integration.

.....

Congo orders cuts to internet and SMS to stifle protests

https://www.engadget.com/2017/12/30/congo-orders-cuts-to-internet-and-sms/

Authoritarian leaders are fond of severing communications in a bid to hold on to power, and that tradition sadly isn't going away. The Democratic Republic of Congo's government has ordered telecoms to cut internet and SMS access ahead of planned mass protests against President Joseph Kabila, whose administration has continuously delayed elections to replace him. Telecom minister Emery Okundji told Reuters that it was a response to "violence that is being prepared," but people aren't buying that argument. Officials had already banned demonstrations, and the country has history of cutting communications and blocking social network access in a bid to quash dissent.

Congo: Another Bad Year

https://www.strategypage.com/qnd/congo/articles/20171218.aspx

In Congo opposition political groups have accused the government of recruiting former M23 rebels to serve as political enforcers. The opposition claims security officials recruited at least 200 former M23 gunmen in late 2016 and sent them to areas (Kinshasa, Goma and Lubumbashi) where government opposition was most active. The government said the claims were ridiculous.

Rebels kill 15 peacekeepers in Congo in worst attack on U.N. in recent history

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-congo-un/rebels-kill-15-peacekeepers-in-congo-in-worst-attack-on-u-n-in-recent-history-idUSKBN1E21YK?il=0

Suspected Ugandan rebels killed at least 15 Tanzanian U.N. peacekeepers and wounded 53 others in a raid on a base in Congo that U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Friday called the worst attack on the organization in recent history.

Congo's hidden mega-crisis

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/inpictures/congo-hidden-mega-crisis-171207065034530.html

DR Congo has been declared the country worst affected by conflict displacement in the world, according to the International Displacement Monitoring Centre.

The Congo crisis has outpaced Syria, Yemen and Iraq in the number of people forced to flee in the first six months of the year. An average of 5,500 people a day are being uprooted from their homes because of violence and insecurity.

DR Congo: leaders of opposition group in police custody

http://www.africanews.com/2017/11/30/dr-congo-leaders-of-opposition-group-in-police-custody/

*Some senior opposition figures in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have been arrested by the police.
Martin Fayulu and Kabund leaders of opposition in the country are under the police custody for questioning for non-compliance of a government decision prohibiting demonstrations.*

The opposition in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the movements of citizens had called on their members to go on the Streets on Thursday for a walk they call “walk of anger.”

An anger against President Joseph Kabila whose presidential mandate elapsed since December 2016.

DR Congo bans marches over delayed polls

https://citizen.co.za/news/news-africa/1741335/drcongo-vote-demo/

The Democratic Republic of Congo on Sunday banned rallies due this week in the capital Kinshasa over the extended rule of President Joseph Kabila despite global concern over a crackdown.

Mineral-rich but chronically poor, politically unstable and saddled with a reputation for entrenched corruption, DR Congo is facing the risk of a flare-up of violence over Kabila’s decision to stay in office.

He was scheduled to have stepped down in December this year after a constitutional maximum of two terms in office.

Pressured by the international community, DR Congo has now scheduled the vote for December 23, 2018.

Authorities in the capital Kinshasa said all planned demonstrations this week were banned, in a statement carried on websites.

DRC makes arrests ahead of anti-Kabila protests

https://www.news24.com/Africa/News/drc-makes-arrests-ahead-of-anti-kabila-protests-20171116


Police in the Democratic Republic of Congo on Wednesday stifled street protests against the extended rule of President Joseph Kabila, making several dozen arrests according to campaign groups, despite a UN appeal to allow peaceful demonstrations.

The Lucha citizens' movement said at least 27 were detained by police in North Kivu province in the country's east, including 15 in the provincial capital Goma.

Can China lead Greece out of darkness?

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-23887509

Eastern promise

"China and Greece have a long history," says the guide, Zhange He. "And we understand each other so we want to travel here. In the last couple of years, the Chinese economy is getting good so we can spend more money here to help the Greek economy."

"Greeks are shifting more towards the east," says another student, Efi Belsi. "The economy there is better than in Europe or even the United States. People want a better future so they are looking towards China."

Everything you need to know about Glencore, Dan Gertler and their interest in DRC

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/nov/05/what-is-glencore-who-is-dan-gertler-drc-mining?CMP=share_btn_tw

Who is Dan Gertler?

The scion of one of Israel’s most famous diamond families, he arrived in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 1997 and in the two decades since has become an unofficial gatekeeper for mining deals across the country.

His activities have attracted international controversy. In 2001, the UN reported that Gertler had entered into a deal with the then DRC president to trade $20m – used to buy weapons – in exchange for a monopoly on DRC’s diamond market. And in 2013, the Africa Progress Panel estimated that in one three-year period DRC had lost more than $1.3bn from the underpricing of mining assets sold to offshore companies connected to Gertler.

Huge sums in mining revenue off the books in DR Congo

https://www.independent.co.ug/huge-sums-mining-revenue-off-books-dr-congo/

Gecamines wields control of the vast nation’s “best mining permits”, enabling it “to generate substantial revenues from its partnerships, averaging US$262 million per year in royalties, bonuses and other contractual fees from 2009 to 2014,” the report said.

“Those revenues are not directed to the public treasury, and they are largely beyond the realm of public oversight,” it said.

It noted that significant income generated by mining proved “difficult to trace” ahead of elections that took place in 2006 and 2011, both won by President Joseph Kabila.

The NGO Global Witness charged in July that the Congolese mining sector served as a funding machine for the Kabila regime, which has been in power since 2001.

“A toxic combination of corruption and mismanagement in Congo’s revenues agencies and state mining companies is leaching a fifth of mining revenues away from the state budget that should be used on vital public services such as schools, hospitals and roads,” Global Witness asserted in its report.

Congo’s Wake Up Call

https://reliefweb.int/report/democratic-republic-congo/congo-s-wake-call

Epicentre of the crisis

The Level 3 emergency was activated on 20 October across DR Congo, with a focus on Kasaï, Tanganyika and South Kivu provinces. Violence in Kasaï, Tanganyika and South Kivu has displaced millions over the past year. Close to 4.3 million people in these areas are estimated to face crisis or emergency levels of food insecurity.

President of Congo Republic Denis Sassou Nguesso has called for a regional action to mitigate the escalating crisis in neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo.

http://www.africanews.com/2017/10/20/congo-president-calls-for-cross-border-action-to-tackle-dr-congo-crisis/

“We need a concerted and cross-border action to tackle the crisis in the Democratic Republic of Congo which is very worrying,” he said.

“During my tenure as the head of the Conference, I will create the necessary conditions for dialogue to give a new impetus to the return of peace in the Great Lakes region,” he added.

Congo-Kinshasa: 'Kabila is Using Delaying Tactics'

http://allafrica.com/stories/201710140056.html

It is undoubtedly true that, in Congo, organizing elections is extremely complicated. It's a vast country with very limited infrastructure. The last two presidential elections in Congo have been very, very complicated to organize. So the electoral commission is undoubtedly telling the truth when they say that they need a huge amount of time to do this. But the bigger question is why are they only beginning to organize the elections now? With the elections having being scheduled for six months ago, the preparations for this vote really should have happened two years ago. So again, this is part of a deliberate stalling tactic. For the electoral commission to say "Look, we need another year and a half," sort of ignores the fact that these preparations really should have begun a long time ago. So this is all part of the same deliberate delaying tactic.

Mob cheers on rape, killing of woman who served ‘forbidden fish’

http://nypost.com/2017/10/10/mob-cheers-on-rape-killing-of-woman-who-served-forbidden-fish/

“They said she gave them beans that contained pieces of a small, local fish,” a Luebo resident told France 24 about the eatery owner.

“Convinced that she had broken their protection charms, the council of rebels sentenced both the woman and the son of her husband’s second wife to commit incest in public,” the resident said.

In the footage, rebel leader Kalamba Kambangoma holds the victim by her hair and explains in the local Tshiluba language that “she must die” for committing high treason.

Amazingly, video just happens to resurface right around election time... rip to the lady and her son.

The asylee: He fled the Congo after being tortured and threatened with death

http://www.pressherald.com/2017/10/08/the-asylum-seeker-marcel-kabongo-mafuku-fled-the-congo-after-being-tortured-and-threatened-with-death/

Mafuku’s troubles in Democratic Republic of the Congo began in 2010, when he stopped supporting a charity allegedly being used by President Joseph Kabila to garner public support.

Kabila ascended to office after his father was assassinated in 2001, then survived a disputed election and last year refused to step down in defiance of term limits.

Mafuku blames Kabila for violence and human rights violations, including the killing of civilians, in his homeland. He did not want to be seen as supporting him, he said, so he stopped donating money.

“I said, ‘That is not a charity. That is not independent. It is like you work with government.’ So I refuse that,” Mafuku said. “After I refused that, the problem begin.”

At the time, Mafuku owned businesses that he said provided internet connections to customers.

Mafuku said that while he was giving money to the organization, he was not required to pay any taxes. When he stopped donating, he assured the authorities he would pay taxes, but they ended up closing his businesses, he said.

Then Mafuku joined a human rights organization in 2013, and his problems worsened.

Wow, what a journey.

Kabila sits tight as Congo crumbles

https://www.irinnews.org/investigations/2017/10/05/kabila-sits-tight-congo-crumbles

Violent prison breaks, militiamen attacking the city, a plummeting economy. For the Kinois, residents of the Democratic Republic of Congo’s capital, Kinshasa, they are all symptoms of the same crisis and the fault of the same man: President Joseph Kabila and his refusal to let go of power.

Congo warlord seeks to unite rebel factions in anti-Kabila alliance

https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/africa/2017-10-01-congo-warlord-seeks-to-unite-rebel-factions-in-anti-kabila-alliance/

Yakutumba, who fought alongside the army against Rwandan troops in earlier wars, is spearheading an attempt to unify disparate eastern rebel factions into a force that can oust President Joseph Kabila, who refused to step down when his second and final term in office expired last year.

This marks the most serious effort by a militia leader in Congo's lawless east to combine insurgent groups since Kabila refused to quit power, raising the spectre of generalised conflict along the lines of the Congolese wars of the 1990s, which killed millions of people.

Yakutumba and his rebels are counting on widespread, growing frustration at Kabila's reluctance to step aside and delays to an election to succeed him.

Thousands Fleeing Congo Soldiers Enter Zambia

https://www.voanews.com/a/thousands-flee-congo-enter-zambia/4041240.html

Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) government forces have been killing civilians in an insurgency-hit region, prompting the latest influx of refugees into northern Zambia, a senior U.N. official said, citing accounts of asylum seekers.

Zambia fears a looming humanitarian crisis after more than 6,000 refugees fleeing turmoil in the DRC entered its territory in one month.

Pierrine Aylara, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) chief representative in Zambia, told Reuters that the latest asylum seekers had said they were fleeing Congolese government forces.

Zambia fears humanitarian crisis as influx of Congo refugees escalates

http://www.businessinsider.com/r-zambia-fears-humanitarian-crisis-as-influx-of-congo-refugees-escalates-2017-9

Zambia fears a looming humanitarian crisis after more than 6,000 refugees fleeing turmoil in neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) entered its territory in one month, the presidency said on Friday.

Thousands of people have been killed and more than one million forced to flee their homes in the DRC's eastern Kasai region since the start of an insurrection nearly a year ago by the Kamuina Nsapu militia, which is demanding the withdrawal of military forces from the area.

Congo leads world in sex abuse allegations

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/africa/un-mission-in-congo-forces-reckoning-over-sex-abuse-scandal/2017/09/21/997573c0-9ead-11e7-b2a7-bc70b6f98089_story.html?utm_term=.0f5c9b79acf3

The girl was only 11 when the first peacekeeper raped her, luring her with bread and a banana as she was leaving school in her village in northeastern Congo.

“It was the first man who ever touched me,” said Bora, who asked that only her first name be used because she is a rape victim. The rape left her pregnant, and she gave birth to a son.

She was 13 when the second peacekeeper raped her. She once again got pregnant, and became a mother twice over while she was still a child herself.

Congo Miners Claim $1.2 Billion of Unpaid Tax Reimbursements

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-15/congo-miners-claim-1-2-billion-of-unpaid-state-reimbursements

The Democratic Republic of Congo’s main business federation said miners are facing financial difficulties because the state failed to reimburse more than $1.2 billion of taxes and duties, as it warned a proposed new mining code may cause the industry to slow.

The sum includes non-reimbursed value-added-tax payments and customs duties, along with an unduly collected minimum tax on earnings, the Federation des Entreprises du Congo’s president, Albert Yuma, said in a Sept. 11 letter to Mines Minister Martin Kabwelulu. Withheld VAT reimbursements account for as much as $900 million of the amount, the federation’s managing director, Kimona Bononge, said by phone from the capital, Kinshasa, on Wednesday.

The outstanding VAT credits are causing “serious difficulties for the finances of actors present in the DRC,” according to the letter seen by Bloomberg and verified by the federation. The state’s failure to release the funds is “comparable to an interest-free and maturity-free loan,” it said.

Children flee, fight amid Congo's growing Kasai violence

http://www.wral.com/children-flee-fight-amid-congo-s-growing-kasai-violence/16953877/

Congo's Kasai region is the latest deadly hotspot in the vast Central African country that has had violent rebellions for decades. Once again, children are among the most vulnerable victims.

Well over 1 million people have fled the fighting that began a year ago when Congo's military killed the regional tribal leader of the Kamwina Nsapu militia. More than 3,300 people in the region have died, according to estimates by the Catholic church. The United Nations has counted more than 80 mass graves.

"About 440,000 children in the Kasai region could not complete their schooling last year, largely due to the violence and insecurity, UNICEF says."