Global Policy Forum

The United Nations (UN) is ready to assist in establishing an International Criminal Tribunal for Congo (ICTC) once the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) puts in a request.

Head of the UN Security Council Mission to the Great Lakes Region, Ambassador Jean-David Levitte has told an independent publication here that the UN was ready to assist DRC in a move to establish the tribunal. "People of DRC and their government must make the first move by showing interest in putting in place a tribunal for war criminals, after which we as the UN will assist them," Levitte who is also France's Ambassador at the UN told the local paper, The African yesterday.

He said the UN could not go into DRC and decide for the Congolese, but the Congolese must decide first, then the UN would take up the request and give the required assistance. The 12-man UN Security Council mission was in Tanzania yesterday and paid a courtesy call on the President Benjamin Mkapa.

An idea to support establishment of a tribunal for DRC comes at the time when President Joseph Kabila has already said those who massacred Congolese must stand trial some day. President Kabila said so during his recent visit in Tanzania. He said that what took place in his country was genocide similar to the one which took place in Rwanda in 1994 that left more than 800,000 people died. He said the international community would do great injustice to the Congolese if the international tribunal were not brought to Congo.

More than 2 million Congolese including former President Laurent Kabila, have been killed since the war of aggression erupted in the country in 1997. "Those who massacred innocent people in the DRC are well known by the Congolese, and none of the murders has any kind of immunity with respect to the crimes committed in the DRC," Levitte has been reported as saying.

Already the Kinshasa government has started to release the findings of an official inquiry into Kabila's January assassination, which also accuses Rwanda; Uganda and some unnamed foreign governments of being party to the plot. Uganda has, according to the media, firmly rejected a report.

The UN team is in Africa on a verification mission on the conflict in the DRC and to revamp the Lusaka Peace Agreement signed in 1999. By yesterday the team had visited South Africa, Namibia, DRC, Burundi, Tanzania and was due to meet Rwandan and Ugandan Presidents in their respective capitals. The team said there were facts on the ground to indicate peace in the DRC would take root.