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Conflict and abuses against civilians

Against the backdrop of rising ethnic tensions in the region, civilians became an all too familiar target of armed groups during fighting that occurred when the national army attempted to reassert control in North Kivu province.  Two cases of such abuses are documented below.

Congolese army attempts to assert control

Faced with the threat of Rwandan intervention and the continued recalcitrance of North Kivu authorities, the transitional government deployed some 10,000 troops, recently integrated into the FARDC, to the east. It also called Governor Serufuli and the North Kivu regional military commander to Kinshasa at the end of November.  By early January the national army replaced the commander, a Tutsi from RCD-Goma, with Gen. Gabriel Amisi (also known as “Tango Fort”) a well-known “non-Rwandophone” RCD officer. ⁵³

In December FARDC troops under central control clashed with those loyal to RCD-Goma in three areas of North Kivu: north of Goma at Kanyabayonga, west of Goma in Walikale and Masisi, and southwest of Goma at Bweremana.

The newly deployed FARDC soldiers engaged the troops loyal to RCD-Goma army on December 12 at Kanyabayonga, the northern limit of the RCD-Goma controlled area.  By December 19 the FARDC troops had been forced to fall back about thirty kilometers further north, looting massively as they retreated. ⁵⁴  As a result of the fighting some 180,000 people deserted Kanyabayonga and villages to the north, fleeing into the bush where they had virtually no access to humanitarian assistance for several weeks. Some of those who fled were doing so for the third or fourth time in as many weeks. ⁵⁵  

During the fighting at Kanyabayonga, troops of all factions of the supposedly unified FARDC army committed human rights abuses and violations of international humanitarian law amounting to war crimes. Those responsible included the newly arrived forces from the west (primarily ex-FAC and ex-MLC troops⁵⁶); their local ex-Mayi-Mayi militia and ex-APC⁵⁷ allies; and forces of the former RCD-Goma army (ex-ANC, Armée Nationale Congolaise).  MONUC human rights investigators gathered testimony concerning 136 cases of rape perpetrated by FARDC troops of these various factions in and around Kanyabayonga, including ex-ANC, ex-APC, and ex-MLC.⁵⁸  Villagers seeking refuge in Lubero to the north described systematic pillaging by the retreating central government troop (primarily ex-MLC and ex-APC.)⁵⁹ Soldiers threatened humanitarian workers at gunpoint in order to force them to provide transport to soldiers.⁶⁰ The fighting, which caused hundreds of military casualties as well as inflicting enormous suffering on civilians, resulted in no apparent strategic gain for either side.⁶¹

Meanwhile FARDC troops from Kisangani took control of Walikale center, west of Goma, on December 18, two days after troops loyal to the RCD-Goma retreated eastward. They were greeted as liberators by Walikale residents who had been forced to flee twice from the town during 2004 because of fighting between troops loyal to RCD-Goma and former Mayi-Mayi forces, spending weeks in the surrounding forest exposed to hunger and disease.  The retreating troops loyal to RCD-Goma contributed to insecurity at the border between Masisi and Walikale, where major fighting ensued (see below on Nyabyondo).  Almost simultaneously, troops loyal to RCD-Goma and Mayi-Mayi troops clashed in Rutshuru territory (see below on Buramba).

Other troops attached to RCD-Goma fought to maintain control of Bweremana, fifty kilometers southwest of Goma and near the South Kivu border, seeking to prevent General Budja Mabe of South Kivu from joining forces with the former Mayi-Mayi in North Kivu. The regional military commander of North Kivu, a Tutsi loyal to RCD-Goma, replaced the head of the Mayi-Mayi brigade and arrested him.  Troops still loyal to the Mayi-Mayi commander skirmished with others who accepted the new appointee and who were supported by troops linked to RCD-Goma.⁶² According to witnesses, the former Mayi-Mayi replenished their arms at Minova, just across the border in South Kivu.⁶³  According to sources on both sides, FARDC at Minova launched rockets into North Kivu to support the former Mayi-Mayi.⁶⁴ On December 11, nonetheless, the troops linked to RCD-Goma defeated the Mayi-Mayi who fled into South Kivu, along with many Hunde who feared being taken for Mayi-Mayi supporters and suffering reprisals.⁶⁵ Marking the border between North and South Kivu, this area remains a potential flashpoint for conflict between FARDC soldiers and those linked to RCD-Goma as well as between Hutu and Hunde, who have frequently fought over land and customary authority.⁶⁶ 

Abuses against civilians at Nyabyondo, Masisi

In mid-December, troops loyal to the central government fought RCD-Goma troops, also officially part of the Congolese national army, in and around Nyabyondo. Mayi-Mayi troops loyal to the central government attacked Hutu villages, killing civilians indiscriminately. RCD-Goma troops responded with a coordinated attack on the Mayi-Mayi stronghold at Nyabyondo, also without distinguishing between military and civilian targets. After the combat ended, RCD-Goma troops and Hutu civilians continued to track down fleeing civilians from other ethnic groups, apparently searching for Mayi-Mayi combatants. They systematically looted, beat, and sometimes executed the civilians they found. They also raped many women and girls, terrorizing the civilians and preventing them from returning home. Soldiers of the 11^th brigade killed at least sixty civilians and raped dozens of others, according to an investigation by the MONUC human rights unit.⁶⁷

On December 19, 2004 troops of the FARDC 11^th brigade loyal to RCD-Goma and commanded by Colonel Bonane attacked Nyabyondo and surrounding villages, the stronghold of the FARDC 13^th brigade, made up of former Mayi-Mayi and commanded by Colonel Akilimali.  Thousands of villagers fled in panic. 

Several days earlier former Mayi-Mayi attacked a nearby Hutu village during a wedding celebration, killing some civilians.  According to a young Hutu woman injured in the attack, the former Mayi-Mayi threw a grenade at a house where the bride and other girls were preparing for the festivities. She said:

My three-year-old cousin was on my back.  She was killed by the same explosion.  Three people were killed and some others were injured but not badly. . . .  If I didn’t have the child on my back I’d be dead also….  The Hunde threw the bomb.  They call them Mayi-Mayi.⁶⁸

During the next week or so, 11^th brigade troops loyal to the RCD-Goma attacked along three axes approaching Nyabyondo. One of the people they targeted was a Hunde customary leader, Baroki Mine’ene of Bukombo, whom they captured and brought to Captain Munyamariba’s post at Mianja, where he was murdered several days later.⁶⁹  According to Mine’ene’s family, a Hutu friend tried unsuccessfully to pay to save his life.⁷⁰  Soldiers linked to RCD-Goma were said to have later bragged about the killing in Masisi town.  One witness told a Human Rights Watch researcher, “They said to us, ‘Your so-called chief collaborated with Mayi-Mayi and Interahamwe.  Now we killed him.’”⁷¹  

A relative described the killing of Mbaende Léopold, another victim from Bukombo’s customary Hunde elite. He said, “Mbaende was in the house and saw soldiers trying to take chickens in his yard.  He went out into the yard to stop the soldiers whom he had mistakenly thought were Mayi-Mayi.  They shot him in the chest and the bullet came out his back….  Two days later we went back to bury him.”⁷²

Some soldiers shot into a group of civilians in a village outside Nyabyondo, seriously wounding at least one person.  The father of an injured boy said,

They [soldiers] immediately burned the Mayi-Mayi post on the hill.  The Mayi-Mayi have this post but spend the day among the villagers.  [When the shooting began] the Mayi-Mayi left their post, retreating through the village and disappeared. . . .  People fled in all directions after the Mayi-Mayi left; the Mayi-Mayi were yelling at us to leave.  The RCD thought the Mayi-Mayi were among the civilians so they opened fire on the crowd.  My son was hit in the buttocks and fell on the ground.  I spent a week with him in the bush because we couldn’t get [to a town].⁷³ 

In the days after the fighting, soldiers killed and raped civilians in the course of searching for Mayi-Mayi who they believed were hidden among the rest of the population.   One witness reported that the violence continued for eleven days, during which time he hid in the hills with his family.  “On [December 20] we saw that Hutu and Tutsi were still looking for people, going down paths in the hills.  I saw little temporary straw shelters getting burned on hills facing ours.”⁷⁴  Another witness said, “Three people were killed at Ngesha after December 20, when they were searching for people who were in hiding.”⁷⁵ One witness from an ethnic group related to Hunde reported:

… My aunt Collette Mate’ene . . . went to get some peanuts that were in her house, but when she got near her house she was killed by Tutsi soldiers.⁷⁶  They had asked her, “Where is the rest of the population?”  She said she was alone.  Then they shot her, many times.  So we fled. She got a bullet in the side of the chest.  After that they fled, and we went to get the body.  We dug a tomb with machetes and buried her in it.  She left seven children.⁷⁷

The decomposing body of Lafasi Shekipfumo, a Hunde, identifiable only by the clothing, was found well after the attack.  A witness said that he and Lafasi had fled together from Bukombo into the forest where a group of uniformed men came upon them and started shooting.  Everyone fled in different directions, except Lafasi who was captured and killed.⁷⁸  The body of Hamuli Bishereya, a middle-aged Hunde man, was also found several weeks after the conflict.⁷⁹ 

Soldiers pillaged the property of civilians and of an international humanitarian organization at Nyabyondo.⁸⁰

Sexual violence

It has become usual in eastern Congo for combatants to commit crimes of sexual violence against women and girls in the course of fighting opposing forces. ⁸¹  After the attacks at Nyabyondo and neighboring villages, twenty-six women who had been raped fled east toward Masisi town. A local Masisi-based women’s organization documented these crimes.⁸²  Rapes in the context of conflict are often particularly violent or involve multiple attackers.

One person related how she and another woman had been raped while hiding in the forest on December 20. She said,

Four [Tutsi soldiers⁸³] raped us together.  They took cords and tied our arms behind us.  They were in uniform.  Many people were killed.  I saw five bodies in the forest; they were men in civilian clothes….  My lower stomach hurts; my [arm] muscles are also tired from being tied.  I have done a natural cleaning, but I don’t have money for any [medical] treatment.”⁸⁴ 

Staff at Masisi hospital reported that they had seen one woman who was raped by three soldiers in front of her husband one day and the next day was raped again.⁸⁵ 

A woman from an ethnic group related to Hunde witnessed the killing of a family member before becoming a victim of rape herself.  She succeeded in reaching Masisi town, where she told Human Rights Watch researchers:

I fled Nyabyondo when the RCD came into the village.  I fled to the forest and spent four days there before arriving here.  I had two children on my back and shoulders, and the other three children walked.  I am married but my husband fled. 

[In the forest] we built small shelters with banana leaves.  On the second day, we ran when we saw soldiers coming.  The soldiers asked for all of our things: goats, pigs, etc.  They took everything.  The soldiers asked for my clothes and money too.  Four soldiers raped me.  They left me with nothing.  Even the clothes I’m wearing I got from others….  After that I left that place, went to the river and washed myself there.  Each time I came to a small stream I sat in it.  I went back to find the children the next morning.  I had pain.  Now it is much less, not like before.  I have a chance to go to Goma [to get better medical care] but I don’t know what to do with my children.⁸⁶

At Masisi town, Human Rights Watch researchers encountered a twelve-year old Hunde girl whose feet were badly swollen from four weeks of walking through the forest with her sister. She said:

When the soldiers arrived in Nyabyondo, a woman in the road was fleeing and they shot her in the stomach.  I saw it.  Each person had fled in his own direction.  In the forest, we saw Tutsi soldiers.⁸⁷  They took all our things, and hit me many times and spoke to us in a mean way.  They said, “Where are the Mayi-Mayi?  Can you show us where?”  We said we didn’t know.  Then they told the women to lie on the ground and they started the violence.  I ran away.  I came back to them afterward.  Four women and one girl, my cousin, were raped.⁸⁸

An injured Hunde mother with an injured and heavily bandaged baby told Human Rights Watch researchers that a soldier shot her when she resisted his attempt to rape her.  When others had fled, she had been ill and so had stayed behind with a group of older women, including her grandmother. She said,

A soldier tried to “talk” to me.⁸⁹  This was one of the soldiers who was always there, a Rwandan.⁹⁰  The soldier said, if you refuse I will shoot you.  But I fled, and the soldier shot at me.  I was carrying my child on my back and then noticed blood was flowing from the child.  Then I fell, and he left me.  There was no way to get to a health center, so my grandmother searched for home-made remedies.  We got to the hospital only one and a half weeks after the shooting.⁹¹

Soldiers used sexual violence or the threat of sexual violence to prevent civilians from returning to their homes and fields.  A community leader from Showa said that soldiers denied them access to their fields even one month after the hostilities.  As it was becoming difficult to find sufficient food in Masisi town, a group of seventeen women went back to harvest crops in their fields.  They were all captured, grouped together, and raped.  Three of them were kept for several days.  “They all came back,” said the community leader, “but now no one dares go to the fields.”⁹²

Armed civilians

In at least two places, Bweremana and Nyabyondo, armed civilians joined in the fighting along with FARDC soldiers of units linked to RDC-Goma, showing the intention of authorities to exploit the firepower put in the hands of largely untrained civilians.⁹³ According to several reports, some of those who had distributed arms to civilians, including Captain Munyamariba, helped command the Nyabyondo operation.⁹⁴ 

At the time of the arms distribution in Masisi, recipients of the weapons had already committed crimes, as discussed above. With the attack at Nyabondo, armed civilians tortured and killed some Hunde, helped soldiers hunt down others, and participated in widespread pillaging and destruction of property.⁹⁵

In one case near Showa, armed civilians killed the Hunde chief of locality, Kyahi Shamamba.  A witness told Human Rights Watch researchers:

On December 24, Christmas Eve, at 10 p.m., [Hutu] civilians with weapons appeared in the forest at night, and took Kyahi Shamamba and me.  This was near our field in the bush; we had spent three weeks there.  They beat me and burned a plastic bag over me.⁹⁶  They asked for ransom.  We gave 70,000 FRC (approx. US $145), two pigs, a bag of clothes, and our work tools.  One group left with me, and another group stayed with Shamamba.  Behind me I heard shots.  They had killed him.  They argued over whether to kill me – but they released me and I went back and saw the body of Shamamba.  The next morning I went to tell other people, and we went to get his body and bury it.⁹⁷

In another case a Hunde victim said,       

I was captured by armed civilians at Muhondo at 9 a.m. and released at 3 p.m. on [December] 22.  They were saying that the former Mayi-Mayi, who’d claimed to be so strong, had fled, and now they were the strong ones.  They took us, they said, because these Mayi-Mayi were our own children.  There were three of us.  We were all released because one of us was a very old woman who pleaded for our release; the other one captured was also old.  We were seriously beaten – I spent three weeks without getting up after arriving in Masisi center.  The woman was not touched but the other man was also beaten.⁹⁸

Buramba, Rutshuru territory

At about the same time as the fighting at Kanyabayonga and Nyabyondo, soldiers of the FARDC 123^rd battalion linked to RCD-Goma and under the command of Major Christian Pay Pay deliberately fired upon and killed some thirty civilians in Buramba after three of their own soldiers had been killed in the act of pillaging rice from local residents.⁹⁹  RCD-Goma leaders accused a local Mayi-Mayi group led by Jackson Kambale, a Nande and native of the area, of killing the soldiers. Their troops had skirmished with his militia throughout the year and they believed him to be allied with Rwandan Hutu rebels based in the forest of a nearby national park. ¹⁰⁰  Some local Nande residents, however, said civilians themselves had killed the soldiers to stop the pillaging of their harvest.¹⁰¹   

After learning that soldiers had been killed, troops came from a nearby military camp at Nyamilima and shot into a crowd of civilians. One woman said:

My children were at the church in a welcoming service.  Soldiers came and to empty the church they shot [into the crowd] and people fled.  I heard they were Tutsi soldiers. Seven people were killed there.  My two girls were among them: Zawadi, 14 years old, and Aline, 11 years old.  When I came to the church they were already dead.¹⁰²

Another witness said, “As I ran I saw the body of Kalirikene Théophile, a man about fifty years old.  There was a lot of blood on his clothes.  I saw another body near the church, that of Dassise Kahotole, a twelve- or thirteen-year old girl.”¹⁰³ 

RCD-Goma soldiers occupied Buramba and for ten days prevented residents from returning and vehicles from stopping in the town.¹⁰⁴  According to one report, two men were killed when they returned to Buramba several days after the initial attack in order to bury their father.¹⁰⁵  On the morning of December 27, soldiers attacked a truck that tried to pass through the area.¹⁰⁶ But later on December 27 and 28, soldiers allowed a team of doctors to come to Buramba and they found fifteen bodies there.¹⁰⁷  

This part of Rutschuru territory is inhabited principally by Hutu and Nande, groups that have increasingly come into conflict over land during the last decade. Tensions rose further with killings of people of both groups in June, July, and August 2004, some blamed on Mayi-Mayi, others on soldiers linked to the RCD-Goma or on a Hutu Local Defense Forces.¹⁰⁸  The December attack, with Nande the majority of the victims, increased Nande anger against RCD-Goma and against Hutu thought by the Nande to be associated with them. Although the soldiers linked with RCD-Goma identified local Nande with Jackson’s militia, many Nande had shunned the Mayi-Mayi group which pillaged them as regularly as it did the Hutu.¹⁰⁹  But after the attack on Buramba, some Nande “believed the best revenge is to join Jackson’s group”, according to one well-informed local observer.¹¹⁰

A MONUC human rights team investigated the Buramba killings, accompanied by Congolese staff of a local non-governmental organization, and concluded that at least thirty civilians, the majority of whom were Nande, were killed by soldiers from Major Christian’s 123^rd battalion.¹¹¹ 

Governor Serufuli established a commission to investigate the killings in Buramba.¹¹²  Its report confirms that Major Christian Pay Pay, seconded by Captain Paulin Ndayambaje, commanded troops that engaged in “blind reprisals” against civilians and subsequent pillaging.  But it adds that the “responsibility is shared among all the parties, …[including] the civilian population for supporting the bandits [Mayi-Mayi], who are responsible for many crimes.”¹¹³  Most witnesses quoted in the report acknowledge that soldiers killed civilians but go on to claim that Nande “tribalism,” specified as discrimination against Hutu and support of the Mayi-Mayi, lay at the root of the events.¹¹⁴  In interviews with a Human Rights Watch researcher, Governor Serufuli echoed these sentiments.¹¹⁵ Another RCD leader sought to exonerate the soldiers by claiming the deaths of civilians were merely incidental to combat.¹¹⁶  The commission recommended the prosecution only of soldiers found with pillaged goods, not of any who committed other crimes nor of those in command of the operation.

The role of Governor Serufuli

In the years since he was named governor in 2000, Serufuli has exercised increasing power throughout North Kivu. He has placed persons loyal to him in local posts, displacing customary chiefs, and he has permitted—if not actually directed—subordinates to distribute arms to civilians identified with his party or ethnic group. Although nominally only an administrative official and political leader, Governor Serufuli appeared to exercise considerable influence over and even to give orders to military forces. After FARDC forces loyal to RCD-Goma had come to a stand-off with other FARDC forces north of Kanyabayonga, Governor Serufuli brought the commanders linked to RCD-Goma back to Goma where, in his own words, he helped “negotiate” the retreat of these troops to their original position at Kanyabayonga.¹¹⁷ Governor Serufuli and the regional military commander went to Nyabyondo and Masisi town on January 26 and ordered the soldiers to return to their earlier positions.¹¹⁸ After troops linked to RCD-Goma occupied Buramba, keeping residents from returning, Governor Serufuli “forced” these soldiers to leave, according to his own account.¹¹⁹

During days when hundreds of thousands of dollars of material was pillaged from an international NGO in Nyabyondo, witnesses saw vehicles registered to the provincial administration returning from Nyabyondo to Masisi town at a time when all other civilian activity in the area had ceased.¹²⁰  Soldiers were seen selling diesel fuel in large quantities in Masisi town; such fuel was one of the major items pillaged in Nyabyondo and not readily available in Masisi.¹²¹ 

In accord with his investigatory commission, Governor Serufuli did not press for the prosecution of officers who commanded the Buramba operation. Instead he asked that Major Pay Pay be removed from his command and that the battalion be transferred elsewhere.¹²²

Human rights activists and humanitarian actors targeted

Human rights activists forced to flee

Human rights activists and other civil society leaders in North Kivu suffered harassment after having denounced the arms distribution and subsequent abuses against civilians in North Kivu, specifically attributing responsibility for these acts to the governor and his associates. Several also asserted that Rwandan army troops had supported soldiers linked to RCD-Goma.¹²³

After these statements were made public in December 2004 several activists who had signed them received anonymous telephoned death threats.¹²⁴ Unidentified armed men in uniform came to the home of one activist and warned his family that his work could have serious consequences; two weeks later unidentified people tried to break into his home.  As a result of such threats, four leading human rights activists fled Goma.  When a Human Rights Watch researcher raised these cases with provincial security officials in early February 2005, they admitted that security agents might have threatened the activists, but said that they had not been ordered to do so.¹²⁵  They promised to investigate and to prevent future threats.  But not long afterward unidentified armed men broke into the home of another activist in Goma and beat and robbed him and his wife.¹²⁶ Another instance of harassment took place in Goma on April 23, 2005. Two unidentified men entered the home of a human rights defender, demanded his whereabouts and searched throughout the house. They threatened his family, beating one relative so badly that he afterward required stitches on his face.¹²⁷ 

Work of humanitarian agencies disrupted

Soldiers threatened staff and looted the property of humanitarian organizations in Masisi, Rutshuru and Lubero, disrupting the delivery of assistance to civilians.¹²⁸ In the Nyabyondo area, for example, where soldiers linked to RCD-Goma looted two health centers and caused damage at a third, ten health centers had to restrict their operations for more than a month.¹²⁹  During the combat at Nyabyondo and during the days after soldiers linked to RCD-Goma took control of the town, some $350,000 worth of material was looted from the storehouse of Agro-Action Allemande (AAA), in the area to build a much-needed road from Masisi to Walikale.¹³⁰  As the pillaging continued into January, AAA decided to suspend its work in the area.  Questioned about their possible role in the pillaging by a Human Rights Watch researcher, provincial authorities gave no response except to say that they had been able to restore a small amount of the property to AAA.¹³¹  In late January Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) closed its feeding program in Kabati, Rutshuru and suspended work in nearby Kitshanga, Masisi, after armed men in uniform broke into the Kabati base and stole a vehicle, cash, and other valuables.¹³²  At the time, soldiers linked to RCD-Goma controlled the surrounding area, and there were reports that the stolen vehicle passed through their checkpoint that night without being stopped.¹³³  

Governor Serufuli established another commission of inquiry that attributed responsibility for the Kabati looting to Rwandan Hutu armed groups, said to have pillaged surrounding villages during the same period.¹³⁴

Impunity

As with most war crimes committed in eastern Congo, most of those documented in this report have been neither fully investigated nor prosecuted.¹³⁵   The military prosecutor in North Kivu said that his office had opened a file on the Buramba killings but that prosecuting the officers in command of the operation would endanger the security of his staff.  He said also that his office had no funds to support field investigations or even basic work in the office.¹³⁶   

In one exceptional case, thirty FARDC soldiers in Lubero were tried for crimes ranging from pillage and indiscipline to rape and murder.  None of the soldiers were from the RCD-Goma faction, and the highest-ranking defendant was only a captain.¹³⁷  According to MONUC human rightsobservers, the trial failed to meet international fair trial standards, particularly in failing to afford the accused the right to adequate legal counsel. All thirty defendants were tried in a single trial that lasted only two days; they were assigned counsel only at the last minute before the trial. The defendants were not given the chance to confront their accusers in every case, and MONUC staff observed that inadequate evidence was presented against some defendants. Most of the accused were found guilty and were sentenced to death.  They have appealed their conviction.¹³⁸