Mapping Report > Section I. Most serious violations > CHAPTER II. First Congo War > B. Attacks against Hutu refugees > 5. Équateur

The first refugees arrived in Équateur province in December 1996. This initial group predominately comprised high-ranking civilian and military dignitaries from the old Rwandan regime. The group headed swiftly towards Zongo via Gemena or Gbadolite, and then crossed the Ubangi River to reach the Central African Republic. Most of the refugees did not reach Équateur province until March or April 1997. They arrived on foot, having crossed the forest west of the Kisangani-Ubundu road, and took the road towards Ikela. They then journeyed to the heart of the province along the Ikela-Boende road, in the Tshuapa district. They travelled for the most part in groups of 50 to 200 people, accompanied by a few armed men. Some of the groups were made up exclusively of ex-FAR and Interahamwe militiamen. Like in the other provinces, when they passed through the villages, the latter committed acts of violence against the civilian populations. For their part, the AFDL/APR soldiers reached Équateur province in April via Isangi and Djolu. In this context, the Mapping Team documented the following alleged incidents:

• On 22 April 1997, as they entered Boende, a town 560 kilometres from Mbandaka on the left bank of the Tshuapa River, AFDL/APR soldiers shot dead an unknown number of refugees at the ONATRA (state-owned transport authority) port. Many refugees tried to escape by jumping into the Tshuapa River but they drowned. The refugees in Boende had been waiting for a boat for Mbandaka for several weeks. A first boat carrying refugees had set sail a few weeks before.³⁰³

• Towards 24 April, under AFDL/APR military escort, the refugees who had survived the killings of 22 April boarded canoes and began to cross the Tshuapa River. During the journey, the soldiers killed an unknown number of refugees at the dyke between the right bank of Boende and Lifomi, a village 14 kilometres from Boende.³⁰⁴

The AFDL/APR troops continued to kill refugees around Boende throughout May, June and July 1997.³⁰⁵ By way of example, the Mapping Team documented the following alleged incidents:

• Towards the end of April 1997, AFDL/APR elements burned refugees alive in the village of Lolengi, 48 kilometres from Boende. The soldiers covered the victims’ bodies with plastic sheeting, to which they then set fire.³⁰⁶

• Around 9 May 1997, AFDL/APR units shot dead about twenty refugees near the Lofonda junction, 32 kilometres from Boende. The victims had emerged from the forest after the soldiers promised to help them return to Rwanda.³⁰⁷

Once Boende was captured by the AFDL/APR troops, the refugees on the Ikela road, upriver from the town, fled in several directions. Some headed in the direction of Monkoto, 218 kilometres south of Boende, crossed the Zaire River at Loukolela and entered the Republic of the Congo. Others fled northwards and reached Basankusu via Befale. Most continued to head westwards towards Ingende and Mbandaka, pursued by AFDL/APR soldiers. In this context, the Mapping Team documented the following alleged incidents:

• On 7 may 1997, AFDL/APR units killed at least 10 refugees in the village of Djoa, 310 kilometres from Mbandaka. The refugees had remained in the village awaiting medical care.³⁰⁸

• Also on 7 May 1997, AFDL/APR units killed seven refugees in the village of Bekondji and two in the village of Buya.³⁰⁹

• On 8 May 1997, AFDL/APR units killed nine refugees in Wele village, 25 kilometres from the Ruki River, and thirty refugees on the Lolo dyke linking the village of Yele and the right bank of the Ruki River.³¹⁰
• Between 7 May and 9 May 1997, AFDL/APR units killed an unknown number of refugees along the sixty kilometres between Djoa and the Ruki River.³¹¹

Towards the end of April 1997, thousands of refugees had gathered on the right bank of the Ruki River, waiting for a boat to Mbandaka. In two trips on 1 May and 8 May, the ferry from Ingende, requisitioned for this purpose by the Military Governor, evacuated 4,200 refugees to Irebu, a former naval command centre 120 kilometres south of Mbandaka. Others left for Mbandaka in canoes or on foot. The weakest refugees and the sick, however, were unable to leave the area before the arrival of the AFDL/APR soldiers.

• On 12 May 1997, AFDL/APR units allegedly clubbed to death a dozen civilian refugees between the villages of Lomposo and Kalamba, 85 and seventy kilometres respectively from Mbandaka. On 11 May, AFDL/APR soldiers had arrived onboard two trucks and several jeeps and had spent the night in Itipo parish on the left bank of the Ruki River, approximately 187 kilometres from Mbandaka. On 12 May, they set off again on the road to Mbandaka.³¹²

After spending the night of 12 May to 13 May in the village of Kalamba, the AFDL/APR troops reached Wendji, 20 kilometres from Mbandaka. 6000 refugees were living in a local Red Cross makeshift camp in the village, near an old SECLI plant (Société équatoriale congolaise Lulonga-Ikelemba). They were not armed because the Gendarmerie had confiscated their weapons. Under the aegis of the Bishop of Mbandaka, an assistance and repatriation committee comprising members of the Catholic and Protestant Churches and MSF, ICRC and Caritas, tried to help the refugees but, given that AFDL/APR troops were advancing swiftly towards the zone, the committee elected to arrange the evacuation of the refugees to Irebu.

• On 13 May 1997, in the presence of a number of APR senior figures, AFDL/APR units allegedly killed at least 140 refugees in the village of Wendji. Upon their arrival in the village, the soldiers told the Zairians not to be afraid, as they had come for the refugees. They then made their way towards the camp and opened fire on the refugees. The refugees tried to escape but were trapped by soldiers arriving from the south. On the same day, the soldiers entered the local Red Cross office and killed unaccompanied minors who were awaiting repatriation to Rwanda. On 13 May, the people of Wendji buried 116 bodies. A three-month-old baby who was still alive at the time of burial was killed by an AFDL/APR soldier who was overseeing the burial procedure. On 14 May, another 17 bodies were buried.³¹³

While one group of AFDL/APR soldiers was massacring refugees in Wendji, another headed towards Mbandaka onboard two trucks.

• On the morning of 13 May 1997, the second group of AFDL/APR soldiers allegedly opened fire on an unknown number of refugees who had escaped Wendji and were trying to reach Mbandaka. 18 refugees in particular were killed at the village of Bolenge and three at the Catholic Mission of Iyonda.³¹⁴

Around ten o’clock in the morning on 13 May 1997, several hundred refugees raced into the streets of Mbandaka.

• On 13 May 1997, AFDL/APR soldiers allegedly opened fire on the refugees who had just arrived in Mbandaka, and killed an unknown number of them near the Banque Centrale du Zaïre, on the Avenue Mobutu.³¹⁵

The soldiers then entered the ONATRA port zone, where many refugees had been waiting for days to board a boat for Irebu.

• On 13 May 1997, AFDL/APR units allegedly opened fire on refugees at the ONATRA port for five to ten minutes, killing an unknown number. The commanding officer then ordered the soldiers to stop firing and told the refugees to leave their hideouts. Some jumped into the Zaire River, hoping to escape. The AFDL/APR soldiers then took up position along the river and opened fire. Around two o’clock in the afternoon, the soldiers began to sort the refugees, then clubbed them to death. The next day, the commanding officer of the AFDL/APR soldiers authorised the local Red Cross to collect the bodies for burial in a mass grave five kilometres from Mbandaka, at the Bolenge Protestant Mission. However, many of the bodies at the ONATRA port were dumped in the river. According to some sources, at least 200 people are thought to have been killed in this massacre.³¹⁶

In the end, the survivors of the various massacres committed in the south of Équateur province were moved into a camp at Mbandaka Airport. Starting on 22 May 1997, 13,000 refugees were repatriated by air to Rwanda. Most of the Rwandan refugees who had managed to cross the Zaire River settled in the Republic of the Congo, in three camps approximately 600 kilometres north of Brazzaville: Loukolela (6,500 refugees), Liranga (5,500 refugees) and Ndjoundou (3,500 refugees).

In the second half of 1997, the new regime’s national and provincial authorities systematically hindered the work of the Secretary-General’s fact-finding mission, which was trying to investigate the Wendji and Mbandaka massacres. In November, the Governor of Équateur province, Mola Motya, ordered the human remains from the mass grave at Bolenge to be dug up to erase all trace of evidence before UN investigators could reach the scene. The Minister of the Interior facilitated the exhumation by imposing a curfew in Mbandaka town on 13 November.

The Wendji and Mbandaka massacres revealed the doggedness with which the AFDL/APR soldiers killed the refugees. Although the refugees had often mixed with ex-FAR/Interahamwe units during their flight across Congo/Zaire, by the time the AFDL/APR soldiers arrived in Mbandaka and Wendji, most of the ex-FAR/Interahamwe had already left the zone, as had the FAZ soldiers. Despite this, the AFDL/APR soldiers continued to treat the refugees as armed combatants and military targets.