Mapping Report > Section I. Most serious violations > CHAPTER II. First Congo War > C. Attacks against other civilian populations > Maniema & Katanga

Maniema

On 24 February 1997, the FAZ fled the town of Kindu and AFDL/APR troops entered the town on 27 February.

• Between the end of February and the beginning of March 1997, as they fled across the Kailo territory towards the Kasai provinces, the retreating FAZ soldiers allegedly raped and kidnapped an unknown number of women in the villages of Tchoko, Kasuku, Lukama, Olangate and Tchumba Tchumba, some of whom were used as sex slaves. After several months some of the victims were released but others were never seen again. The FAZ also looted widely and forced civilians to follow the soldiers and carry the stolen ⁴¹⁷

Katanga

As they retreated, the FDD units⁴¹⁸ from South Kivu arrived in the north of Katanga province. They killed civilians and pillaged villages, in particular in the territories of Moba and Pweto.

• In March 1997, FDD units allegedly killed between two and ten civilians in the village of Kansenge in the Mulonde groupement, in the Moba territory. Before they left, they pillaged and torched the ⁴¹⁹

Since the 1970s, a sizeable Tutsi community from the Minembwe plateaus in the Fizi territory in South Kivu had settled in the area of Vyura, a locality situated 150 kilometres from Moba, in the Tanganyika district. As the anti-Tutsi sentiment deepened from 1995 onwards and the start of the First Congo War, relations between the Tutsis of Vyura (known as the Banyavyura) and the rest of the predominately Tabwa population seriously deteriorated.

• In April 1997, at Vyura, in the Moba territory, “Tutsi/Banyamulenge armed units” and AFDL/APR soldiers allegedly killed the tribal chief of Vyura and a member of his family. The victims were arrested in the village of Mwanza. After being led to Vyura, the tribal chief was stripped, tortured and dragged along the road by a vehicle. His nephew was buried alive in the pit where the chief’s body was ⁴²⁰