Mapping Report > Section I. Most serious violations > CHAPTER II. First Congo War > C. Attacks against other civilian populations > North Kivu > Rutshuru

• In the night of 5 June to 6 June 1996, at Bunagana, a village on the Ugandan border, armed units identified as APR and UPDF soldiers allegedly killed between 28 and 36 civilians, most of them Hutu Banyarwanda.³²² According to some sources, Tutsis from Bunagana are thought to have been used as scouts, pointing out the houses of people to be killed to the commandos.³²³

AFDL/APR soldiers began to infiltrate the Bwisha chiefdom in October 1996. Towards mid-October, AFDL/APR units launched their first attack on the FAZ military base at Rumangabo. Aided by ex-FAR/Interahamwe units from the Katale and Mugunga refugee camps, the FAZ drove back the attackers. In the days that followed, additional AFDL/APR soldiers infiltrated the southern part of Rutshuru territory via the Virunga National Park and the Kibumba camp. The new infiltrators cut off the road between the Katale and Mugunga refugee camps and the FAZ military base, with a view to launching a second attack on Rumangabo. From the start of the infiltrations, AFDL/APR troops allegedly massacred civilian populations in the Bweza and Rugari groupements. The victims were principally Hutu Banyarwanda.³²⁴

In almost every instance, the massacres by the AFDL/APR soldiers followed the same pattern. Upon entering a locality, they ordered the people to gather together for a wide variety of reasons. Once they were assembled, the civilians were bound and killed by blows of hammers or hoes to the head. Many witnesses have claimed to have spotted a large number of Tutsi Banyarwanda youths who had left Rutshuru territory between 1990 and 1996 among the AFDL/APR soldiers. According to several witnesses, the AFDL/APR soldiers displayed a clear desire for revenge in their massacres of the Hutu Banyarwanda, targeting villages where Tutsis had been persecuted in the past. In this context, the Mapping Team documented the following alleged incidents:

• On 20 October 1996, AFDL/APR units killed between 70 and 150 civilians in the Musekera locality in the Bweza groupement, in the south of the Rutshuru territory. The soldiers had come to the village the previous night but had found no-one there, as the people had fled. On 20 October, they made a surprise return to the village and swiftly ordered the civilians, who were mostly Hutu Banyarwanda, to gather in the maison communale, or village hall, under the pretext that they were going to hand out food and drink to them. The victims were shut in the maison communale, bound and clubbed to death. Their bodies were then thrown into a latrine.³²⁵
• Around 20 October 1996, AFDL/APR units killed dozens of civilians, mostly Hutu Banyarwanda, in the village of Tanda, near Musekera. The victims were killed with blows of hammers and small hoes. Before they left, the soldiers torched the village.³²⁶
• Around 30 October 1996, AFDL/APR units killed over 800 people, including women and children, in the villages of Bisoko, Mugwata, Ngugo and Kuri-Rugari in the Rugari groupement in Rutshuru territory. In the days leading up to the attack there had been violent clashes between the AFDL/APR soldiers and the FAZ/ex-FAR/Interahamwe around the Rumangabo military base, located near these villages. In November, a local committee compiled a list of the victims containing 830 names. During the massacres the soldiers also pillaged the villages.³²⁷

On 26 October 1996, AFDL/APR soldiers captured Rutshuru town, the administrative headquarters of Rutshuru territory.

• On 26 October 1996, AFDL/APR units allegedly killed an unknown number of Hutu Banyarwanda civilians in the camp for displaced people at Nyongera, several kilometres from Rutshuru. The soldiers surrounded the camp and then opened fire. The victims were mostly Hutu Banyarwanda from the Bwito chiefdom in Rutshuru territory. They had been living in the camp for several years due to the prevailing climate of violence in the Bwito chiefdom. According to one source, however, the massacre is thought to have been preceded by a brief exchange of fire between the AFDL/APR soldiers and the ex-Far/Interahamwe.³²⁸

When the AFDL/APR troops entered Rutshuru, the inhabitants of the surrounding villages fled into the hills in the Busanza groupement.

• On 30 October 1996, AFDL/APR units allegedly killed at least 350 civilians, most of them Hutu Banyarwanda, with blows of hammers to the head in Rutshuru town centre, close to the ANP house.³²⁹ In the days leading up to the massacres, the soldiers had appealed to civilians who had fled the village of Kiringa, one kilometre from Rutshuru, to return home to attend a large public meeting on 30 October. When they returned to the village, the inhabitants of Kiringa were led to Rutshuru town centre and shut away in the ANP house. In the afternoon, the soldiers began to compile a register and asked people of Nande ethnic origin to return home. They then separated the men and women on the grounds that the women had to go and prepare the meal. The women were taken to the Maison de la Poste, where they were executed. The men were bound and led in pairs to asand quarry several dozen metres from the ANP house. All of them were then executed with blows of hammers.³³⁰

Over the course of the weeks that followed, AFDL/APR soldiers committed many massacres in villages in the Busanza, Kisigari and Jomba groupements, to the south and east of Rutshuru. The victims were principally Hutu Banyarwanda civilians. In this context, the Mapping Team documented the following alleged incidents:

• Towards the end of October 1996, AFDL/APR units killed between 30 and 60 people, most of them Hutu Banyarwanda, in the villages of Kashwa and Burayi, close to Rutshuru. Most of the victims had been bound before they were executed with blows of hammers or hoes. Some of the victims were shot dead.³³¹
• Also towards the end of October 1996, AFDL/APR units killed around one hundred civilians, most of them Hutu Banyarwanda, in the villages of the Kisigari groupement in the Rutshuru territory, notably Mushoro, Biruma, Kabaya and The soldiers had rounded up the residents under the pretext that they were going to attend a meeting. Most of the victims were killed with blows of hoes or hammers to the head. Some died when they were trapped in their houses and burned alive. Others died after being thrown into the latrines.³³²
• Around 29 October 1996, AFDL/APR units forced the disappearance of an abbot and four nuns in the Jomba parish, in the Rutshuru territory. The victims were all Hutu Banyarwanda. They were last seen talking to AFDL/APR soldiers. Their bodies have never been found.³³³
• For several weeks, between October and November 1996, AFDL/APR units arrested and killed an unknown number of Hutu Banyarwanda civilians in a building where the AFDL/APR staff were based in Rutshuru town centre.³³⁴ The victims had been intercepted at the checkpoints set up at the entrance to Rutshuru and near the Mondo Giusto hydroelectric plant. The victims’ bodies were then dumped in the Fuko River.³³⁵

• On 18 November 1996, AFDL/APR units massacred several hundred Hutu Banyarwanda at the Mugogo market, 31 kilometres from Rutshuru. Upon their arrival, the soldiers announced that they were going to organise a meeting to introduce the new chief of the locality to the people. After asking non-Hutus and the people of Kiwanja³³⁶ to leave, the soldiers opened fire on the crowd. Some of the victims were killed with blows of hammers or pestles to the head. The early 1990s had borne witness to a conflict over land ownership at the Shinda plantation between the people of Mugogo village and a Tutsi family. Villagers had murdered a member of the Tutsi family.³³⁷ In 2005, the people of Mugogo submitted a list to MONUC Human Rights Office containing the names of 1,589 victims.

• In early November 1996, AFDL/APR units killed several hundred Hutu Banyarwanda in a former IZCN (Zairian Institute for Nature Conservation) camp at Kabaraza, at the entrance to Virunga National Park, 20 kilometres from Rutshuru. The victims were Hutu Banyarwanda who had been apprehended in Ngwenda village at a checkpoint where soldiers would sort people according to their ethnic origin. The soldiers had led them to the former IZCN camp under the pretext that they were going to cultivate bean fields as part of a community project. When they arrived at the camp, the soldiers killed them with pestles. According to most sources, the total number of victims is thought to be as high as 600 people.³³⁸

From late 1996 onwards, the AFDL/APR soldiers began to mass-recruit among the Congolese population. Most of the new recruits were children (CAAFAG),³³⁹ commonly known as the Kadogo (“small ones” in Swahili). In this context, the Mapping Team documented the following alleged incidents:

• In late 1996, AFDL/APR units recruited many minors in the villages around the Kashwa locality in the Gisigari groupement in Rutshuru territory, and in those around Ngungu in the Masisi territory. Recruiting officers went into the village schools, promising the children food or money. They also forcibly enlisted an unknown number of children. Some of the recruits were barely ten years old. Most of the area’s recruits received minimal military training at the Matebe camp located near Rutshuru town centre. During their stay at the camp, the children were tortured and subjected to various kinds of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. They were raped and received only very little food. They were then sent straight to the front line.³⁴⁰
• On 7 may 1997, AFDL/APR units killed over 300 civilians in the villages of the Chanzerwa locality in the Binja groupement. When they arrived in the villages, the soldiers burst into houses and killed an unknown number of civilians with hatchets. They then captured an unknown number of civilians and led them to the village of Buhimba. Having bound and imprisoned them in the main building and courtyard at the church of the 8^th CEPAC (Community of Pentecostal Churches in Central Africa), they killed them with blows of hoes to the head. Those who tried to escape were shot dead. The bodies were then thrown into the latrines, not far from the church. The AFDL/APR troops indiscriminately killed men, women and children. Most of the victims were Hutu Banyarwanda, but many Nande were also massacred at Buhimba. According to several survivors, the AFDL/APR soldiers killed several children by dashing their heads against walls or tree trunks. In all, 334 victims were recorded.³⁴¹
• On 26 May 1997, AFDL/APR units kidnapped and forced the disappearance of at least 17 civilians from the village of Vitshumbi, on the edge of Lake Edward. The victims were accused of killing an AFDL/APR soldier who had died a short while earlier in unexplained circumstances. 22 villagers were led to the Rwindi tourist complex to be interrogated. Five were eventually freed but the others were never seen again.³⁴²