Global perspective Human stories

Numbers of civilians displaced by fighting in DR of Congo skyrockets – UN

Numbers of civilians displaced by fighting in DR of Congo skyrockets – UN

Child who took refuge in Kafe, eastern DR Congo
The number of civilians uprooted by fighting in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) this year has risen dramatically over the past week, with an additional 30,000 to 35,000 people displaced as of today beyond the more than 50,000 already reported, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).

The number of civilians uprooted by fighting in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) this year has risen dramatically over the past week, with an additional 30,000 to 35,000 people displaced as of today beyond the more than 50,000 already reported, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).

The area most affected is the territory of Djugu, just north of Bunia, capital of the Ituri region. Villages have been looted and burned down by armed factions linked to different ethnic groups. Interviews with terrified civilians confirm that there have been widespread killings, rapes, and looting, UNICEF said.

“We need to bring the same sense of urgency to the Congo that we brought to the tsunami, in order to stop the killing of children,” UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy declared, referring to the Indian Ocean disaster which brought a massive outpouring of international aid to the dozen devastated countries.

“This is a country that was moving towards a peace process, with the promise of elections this June. Renewed attacks against civilians puts the transitional process at risk, and are a disaster for Congolese children,” she added from UNICEF headquarters in New York.

The latest fighting between Lendu and Hema militias is part of a larger conflict in the DRC, one of the bloodiest the world has known since World War II, in which some 3.8 million people are thought to have been killed in less than six years, the vast majority of them civilians and the majority of these most probably children.

Many have been killed in fighting, but a far greater number have died of disease and starvation. As homes, hospitals and schools have been destroyed, families and communities trying to escape the fighting found themselves without food, water, shelter or other basic services. Some 1.4 million children suffer from some form of malnutrition.

Ms. Bellamy called the latest fighting “a lethal step backwards for Congo’s children.”

A UNICEF education officer in Bunia, Katya Marino, who has just returned from one of four new UN-guarded sites hosting 50,000 displaced people, said families continue to enter each day. “As soon as you leave Bunia, there is no security beyond those few sites protected by the UN peacekeeping forces. There are armed men, there is a sense of terror, and it is very difficult for us to reach people who need our help.”

UNICEF is providing safe water, sanitation facilities, shelter and cooking materials as well as the distribution of high-protein biscuits for vulnerable children at the sites. Planning is underway to vaccinate children against measles and to start an education programme.

One of the largest current UN peacekeeping forces, nearly 14,000-strong out of a maximum total of 16,700 military personnel, is at present posted throughout the vast country to monitor ceasefire agreements and help the peace process ahead of this year’s scheduled elections.

The Security Council first ordered the deployment of the UN Organization Mission in the DRC (MONUC) in 1999 at much lower strength, reinforcing it several times over the years, mandating its current numbers last October.