Increased military presence and aid alone will not prevent another Makombo Massacre.

By Noelle Barber

The tragedy in Northeastern Congo truly deserves our utmost attention and concern. First, the extent and persistence of the slaughter has resulted in an estimated 6 million deaths since 1996. Congolese in the northeast are brutalized and intimidated daily, men women and children live constantly with the threat of kidnap, rape, torture and death. Second, the extermination of the villages such as Makombo is something you and I, our Congress, and any person with a conscious and a piece of modern technology should take personally: This massacre is directly related to the highly profitable plunder of minerals, such as coltan, tungsten and cobalt, vital to our cell phones and computers. Mother Jones 2010: Blood and Treasure.

Indeed, the government in Kinshasa allows these massacres to continue, Rwandan and Ugandan leadership profit when villages of people are wiped out and enslaved to make room for unregulated resource mining. Yet the international community continues to provide the green light for both Kabila in Congo and Kagame in Rwanda and other international profit seekers to go on with their brutal business. Increased military presence and humanitarian aid will treat some of symptoms, but within this course of action, the underlying disease remains. For years to come it will cost a whole lot more than the 10 million dollars proposed in the Lord's Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act to support and treat the victims of the world’s most brutal and deadly conflict.

It is excellent that the Los Angeles Times has made an effort to expose this horrifying incident to the American public and push for meaningful steps to end the conflict. Allow me to introduce an important perspective, one that cannot be ignored if Congo is to find a sustained and lasting peace within the country and along its borders. It is the voices and insights of the Congolese that must be heard, for in the end, the affairs of the Congo must be determined by the Congolese. Policy alternatives by Congolese.

Congolese Women Offer Prescriptions for Ending Sexual Violence in Congo
By
Bibiane Aningina Tshefu, Women’s Coordinator & Adviser, Friends of the Congo and
Kambale Musavuli, Student Coordinator & Spokesperson, Friends of the Congo

During the week of March 1-12, 2010, several women from the D.R. Congo came to New York to participate at the United Nations 54th Commission on the Status of Women. This is a high level annual international Women’s Forum. The Congolese women represented both government and non-government sectors as well as different provinces of their country. They had ample opportunity to raise their concerns to the gathering during assembly, speak to United Nations officials, policy-makers, members of the New York civil society and community, as well as key members of President Obama’s administration.

The women came with a singular focus, to articulate how Congolese women felt the global community could best address the fourteen-year conflict in the D.R. Congo. Wherever the women ventured, whether it was a community forum in Harlem, gathering at local churches, forums at the United Nations or meetings with Obama administration officials, they articulated a consistent and resolute message. Listen to the Congolese for a change: as “we have repeatedly shared with the international community how they can optimally participate in bringing an end to the geo-strategic resource war in the Congo.”

Western based Think Tanks, humanitarian institutions and policy makers often argue that they have tried everything to bring an end to the conflict. However, a cursory look at the policies that have been prescribed or implemented reveals that almost every policy option tried, has avoided core grassroots women recommendations. Policies implemented by the international community are marked by a reluctance to pressure U.S. and British allies Rwanda, led by Paul Kagame and Uganda, headed by Yoweri Museveni. Also, in spite of the myriad United Nations studies, there has been deadly silence around the role of western mining interests in the perpetuation of the conflict.

The Congolese women shared the following prescriptions to bring an end to the conflict:
1. Call for an Inter-Rwandan dialogue between Rwanda’s Tutsi leadership and Hutu rebels inside Congo. There are no military solutions to what is essentially a political crisis.

2. Opening and expansion of democratic space inside both Rwanda and Uganda so their internal conflicts will cease being fought on the bodies of Congolese women.

3. Greater participation in political life and the decision-making process on the part of Congolese women.

4. Redirection of focus on the part of the global community from targeting the symptoms or effects of the conflict to addressing the root causes - primarily a foreign resource war being waged inside Congo to the detriment of innocent civilians.

In the final analysis, Sexual violence is a consequence of war, therefore, in order to end the violence against women, the conflict must end which requires an end to impunity inside the Congo and in the international community’s involvement in the Congo.

Click on below links to read the messages from the women:

Senator Eve Bazaiba Masudi – "The Political Implication of Congolese Women, for Change and the Promotion of Good Governance in the DRC "

Mme Annie Matundu Mbambi - "The Role and Involvement of Women in the Congolese Peace Process"

Mme Jeanine Gabrielle Ngungu - "The Problematic of Violence Against Women: A Major Challenge in the National Reconstruction Process"

Mme Marie-Claire Faray - "A Message From Congolese Women on the 8th March International Women's Day"

Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) message from Congolese women. Video message read by Katherin Machalek, WILPF consultant.

Remember to join Friends of Congo on the Break the Silence Tour. Click here to see tour stops!

Mr. Kristof:

Your just-concluded Congo series is superb. Thanks. Its two central questions outshine its many other gems: Given the millions already dead and the widespread rape and massive other suffering, why does the Eastern Congo catastrophe receive so little attention--compared to say Haiti or Darfur? And how can Americans ameliorate the situation?

For what they are worth, here are my insights.

Haiti receives big attention mostly because its devastation gives everyone great opportunity to play a beloved role—superior and compassionate Messiahs to the rescue. Because nature is to blame, non-Haitians need feel no guilt. The dramatic TV videos of French and American rescuers pulling out dying Haitians serve an even greater purpose. Those powerful pictures obliterate any possibility of imagining or believing an inconvenient historical truth—that for 200 years and counting, France and America have been ruthlessly strangling Haiti.

Darfur, like Haiti, received massive attention. There Westerners struck even bigger poses as saviors. Witness the largest American coalition calling itself “Save Darfur.” The apparent paradox--Darfur’s shocking devastation is largely man-made—is easily explained: In the age of the war against Islamic terror, what could be better than to give great publicity to bad Muslims killing good Muslims in Darfur?

Though its devastation is even greater, Congo differs in other respects. Unlike Haiti, the Congolese catastrophe is man-made. And unlike Darfur, the villains in Congo are not enemies of the West. Rather the Congo depredations are traceable to the countless “friendly tyrants” in Africa that US and French leaders have continued to nurture, protect and praise since the height of the Cold War. Exhibit A consists of Paul Kagame and Yoweri Museveni today. Exhibit B: Joseph Mobutu sese Seko yesterday. Thus in the Congo, the West collectively will find the Messiah role impossible to pull off. Consequently, it is expecting too much that Western leaders would voluntarily confess their costly Congo blunders to their decent, no-nonsense publics, even if the Congo death toll has exceeded six million.

The sound 4-point plan you present will improve the Congo situation immensely—PROVIDED Washington implements it. Implementation demands strong political will. Translation: We need intense grassroots pressure not unlike the Free South Africa Movement that, 25 years ago, overwhelmed Ronald Reagan’s support of apartheid South Africa.

Your column and The Times have a golden fleeting opportunity to help build today’s movement. Here is how.

Kambale Musavuli is a courageous Congolese studying in the US. With help from concerned Americans, he and other young Congolese have created Friends of the Congo, an advocacy group. It has just started the “Break the Silence” campaign. The aim is to get American campuses discussing events in the Congo.

Publicity. That is the campaign’s sorely-needed oxygen. My key suggestion Mr. Kristof is that your column and the entire New York Times organization should give the campaign significant publicity. This is will turn the young people’s spark into a steady flame.

Thereafter, the flame must be transformed into a fire, a national conversation. Its topic? A thorough review of America’s friendly tyrant policy and its role in the Congo during and since the Cold War.

I admit the conversation will be quite controversial. Inevitably, ideologues and opportunists on the right will try to intimidate critics with charges of hating America. Still, courageous, patriotic Americans must stand firm and the conversation must happen.

If and when it happens, the conversation would entail excruciating American self-examination. However, in Gdansk last September, Angela Merkel demonstrated that painful national self-examination is doable, liberating and beneficial.

Another reason for the American conversation is that Congo’s dead and dying need it. It is a vital first step. Unless it happens, Congo’s agony will be prolonged for an unconscionably long time.

After the conversation starts, subsequent steps must include the four you outline plus vigorous other American policies that hold Mr. Kagame and Mr. Museveni accountable--at least for their direct and indirect actions in the Congo.

So once more thank you very much shining a light on the Congo.

Could you now publicize and help transform the Break the Silence campaign?

Pleeease.

Contact Mr. Akuetteh at niiakuetteh12@yahoo.com

In Nicholas Kristof's latest (February 11, 2010 NY Times Commentary) prescriptions for the Congo he gets a lot wrong. He would benefit a great deal by truly listening to the aspirations of the Congolese people.

Mr. Kristof has one thing right but true to his symptomatic approach around the Congo he has almost everything else wrong. Yes, the United States certainly need to lead a global diplomatic push, it’s the least it can do considering the destructive policies it has had in the Congo for the last 50 years – CIA role in the assassination of democratically elected Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba, the installation and backing of dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, Backing of two invasions (1996 & 1998) of the Congo by its allies Rwanda and Uganda, the carte blanche it has given Rwanda and Uganda in spite of their decade-long destabilization of the Congo, the silence around U.S. corporate looting of Congo’s minerals and its repeated backing of the militarization (President Obama should dismantle the Bush-Rumsfeld initiated AFRICOM http://www.resistafricom.org) of the Congo.

The Four step approach that would work best to end the conflict is:

1. Listen to the Congolese (http://www.change.org/friendsofthecongo). The last thing the Congolese need is yet more Western imposed solutions which are intrinsically limited because almost all these solutions seek to protect and prioritize U.S. strategic and Corporate interests in Central Africa at the expense of the people.

2. President Obama needs to change the way he along with both the Bush and Clinton administrations has engaged in Congo. Jim D ought to know that the US is already in the Congo and spending money there (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/07/world/africa/07congo.html?_r=1). It’s that they have prioritized military options as opposed to diplomacy and a political path and of course they have prioritized profit over the people. Those western corporations (http://conflictminerals.org/us-canadian-companies-involved-in-congo/)that have pilfered Congo over the past 14 years should be held to account and provide restitution to the Congolese people.

3. The United States need to hold its allies Rwanda and Uganda (The International Court of Justice ruled in 2005 that Congo is entitled to $10 billion in reparations from Uganda (http://www.globalpolicy.org/intljustice/icj/2007/0726ugandapayup.htm) because of its looting of Congo’s wealth and commission of crimes against humanity) accountable in a similar fashion to the manner in which Sweden and Netherlands did in 2008 by withholding aid from Rwanda because of its destabilization efforts in Congo. The United States can do this by enforcing the laws it already has on its books. Public law 109-456, Democratic Republic of the Congo Relief, Security and Democracy Promotion Act of 2006, section 105 calls for the Secretary of State to withhold foreign assistance to neighboring countries that destabilize the Congo.

4. President Obama can break from the past and establish a new relationship with Africa by finally genuinely supporting the non-violent democratic forces in the Congo. President Obama should make good on his words in his Ghana speech of July 2009 (http://www.america.gov/st/texttrans-english/2009/July/20090711110050abretnuh0.1079783.html) when he noted that he aims to support strong institutions and not strong men. Well, he can start by drastically curbing support for US strongmen Yoweri Museveni and Paul Kagame (an international arrest warrant (http://jicj.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/6/5/1003) is out on 40 of his top officials by a Spanish court for committing crimes against humanity and war crimes in the Congo; Kagame would be on the list too if he were not a sitting head of state). He can in turn support and help strengthen local institutions in the Congo and while making the US a partner for democracy in the Congo by using its diplomatic heft to assure free and transparent elections in 2011.

“Haiti today faced a natural disaster of unprecedented proportion, an earthquake unlike anything the country has ever experienced.

The magnitude 7.0 earthquake – and several very strong aftershocks – struck only 10 miles from Port-au-Prince.

I cannot stress enough what a human disaster this is, and idle hands will only make this tragedy worse. The over 2 million people in Port-au-Prince tonight face catastrophe alone. We must act now.

President Obama has already said that the U.S. stands ‘ready to assist’ the Haitian people. The U.S. Military is the only group trained and prepared to offer that assistance immediately. They must do so as soon as possible. The international community must also rise to the occasion and help the Haitian people in every way possible.”

Many people have already reached out to see what they can do right now. We are asking those interested to please do one of two things: Either you can use your cell phone to text “Yele” to 501501, which will automatically donate $5 to the Yele Haiti Earthquake Fund (it will be charged to your cell phone bill), or you can click here to DONATE.

Wyclef Jean

Articles and Historical Sources on Haiti:
Haiti: the land where children eat mud By Alex von Tunzelmann
Country Without a Net by Tracy Kidder
How the U.S. impoverished Haiti by Jean Damu

Black Jacobins by C. L. R. James
Toussaint l'Ouverture biography
Jean-Jacques Dessalines Biography
Naomi Klein on Haiti Disaster Capitalism

The United Nations group of experts recently published their final report of the group of experts (PDF). They have been issuing reports on the Congo Crisis for the last decade. This report (PDF) is the latest in a series of reports published on the on-going conflict in the Congo and should be read as such, as opposed to the manner in which some misguided Think Tanks and media outlets have interpreted the report (PDF). A classic case of the misguided reading has been spurious reports that the “first” American company has been identified as participating in the trade of so-called conflict minerals. The fact of the matter is the United Nations has done a plethora of studies since 2001 identifying US companies that have contributed to the fueling of the conflict in the Congo. See a list of Western Companies involved in Congo since the 1996 invasion by US allies Rwanda and Uganda.

Human Rights Watch also published a recent report, which assessed the joint operations between the Congolese military and the United Nations forces. As expected the report was critical of the joint operations and recommended that the United Nations end its support of the military operations.
Read HRW Press Release
Read HRW full report

In the wake of this morning’s report by Bloomberg news we have to take a moment to lay bear how the game is really played and some of the reasons why Congo is likely to remain dependent and impoverished for at least another generation and maybe more.

As the Paris Club meets (although the affairs of the Congo are being determined, no Congolese official is a part of these talks or decisions in Paris) to decide upon the “forgiveness” of a portion of Congo’s illegitimate and odious $11 billion debt accumulated during the Western-backed dictatorial Mobutu era (1965 - 1997), the United States and Canada are apparently seeking “clarification” on the Freeport McMoran and First Quantum contracts; both of which are a part of the contract review process began by the Congolese government in 2007.

These are part and parcel of the contracts that experts reviewing the contracts on behalf of the Carter Center said that they had not seen such egregiously lopsided contracts in 30 years of assessing such contracts. These are the very same contracts that the United States and Canada have been silent on in spite of the plethora of independent studies that have clearly documented how lopsided and opaque they have been and the degree to which they exploit the people of the Congo.

As a result of the contract review process (2007 – present), the government canceled the First Quantum deal (First Quantum says it is still seeking a negotiated solution) and the Freeport McMoran deal is still unresolved. In our unpacking of the Chinese deal we will compare the Chinese deal with the Freeport McMoran contract in upcoming blogs in this series.

Anatomy of the Chinese Deal

The deal was established in the Fall of 2007, finally consummated in the Spring of 2008 and given the green light by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in October 2009 after the restructuring of the deal to meet IMF terms. It is a mineral for infrastructure swap between the Congolese government and the Chinese government represented by a number of state companies. The basic principle is that the deal would provide the Congo with transport and social infrastructure in exchange for access to mineral resources.

Players: Gecamines, Sinohydro Corporation, China Railway Group, Metallurgical Group Corporation
Type of Partnership: Joint Venture
Equity: China 68 percent Congo 32 percent (Congo only receives 17% equity in its deal with American company Freeport McMoran)
Initial Value of the Deal: $9 billion
Renegotiated Value due to IMF pressure: $6 billion
Duration of Contract: Approximately 30 years

Stated Benefit to Congo:
4,000 KM road network
3,200 KM Rail system
31 Hospitals with 135 beds each
145 Health Centers with 50 beds each
49 clean water distribution centers
4 large universities
A Parliament building

Stated Benefit to China:
10.6 million tons of copper and 626,619 tons of cobalt

Year concessions expected to come into Production: 2013

Primary demand of the IMF: The deal had to be restructured so that the Congolese government would not assume any additional debt. As a part of the initial deal the Chinese had required the Congolese government would guarantee the repayment of the infrastructure investments in case the profits of the mining projects would not be sufficient to offset the costs of the development of the infrastructure projects.

IMF Promises as a result of the renegotiated Chinese deal: Paris Club would forgive most of the Congo’s $11 billion debt. IMF would provide Congo with $600 million for government operations under a new three-year “poverty reduction” agreement (2009 – 2011).