DR of Congo: UN mission plans new operation to improve conditions

The Indian Battalion of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) is planning to set up a medical camp in North Kivu as part of its "Operation Dove Flight" to improve the lot of victims of the conflict which resurged early last month.

In the operation, the World Food Programme (WFP) and the battalion, IndBatt-1, are assessing the amount of aid required for the victims of the conflict along the critical Kiwanja-Ishasha-Nyakakoma axis. Several villages were captured by rebel Mayi-Mayi militia members, along with the Hutu-dominated Interahamwe of Rwanda, and were recaptured by the Armed Forces of DRC (FARDC) and IndBatt-1, the mission said.

Approximately 5,000 people were displaced from the cluster of villages and some of them fled into the bush, it said. Some 60 tons of food were distributed to 450 displaced families in Kiwanja last Thursday.