An airplane carrying humanitarian workers crashed on approach to Bukavu, the capital of Democratic Republic of Congo’s South Kivu province, on 1 September.

“We don’t yet have the official [passenger] list so we don’t know the nationality of the passengers or their organisations,” said Christophe Illemasene, spokesman for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Illemasene said there had been 17 people, including two crew members, on board the aircraft, a Beechcraft 1900. He added that the UN Mission in the DRC (MONUC) had dispatched a helicopter to the scene early on the morning of 2 September with a search and rescue team.

“The helicopter landed far away [from the wreckage] and the search and rescue team headed to the site on foot,” he added.
The plane had flown from Kinshasa bound for Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, with stopovers scheduled in the provincial capitals of Mbandaka, Kisangani and Bukavu.

Amy Cathey of Air Serv International, the flight operator, said the accident happened on the approach to Bukavu amid bad weather.

Aviation accidents occur very frequently in DRC. For many people travelling long distances, planes are the only viable option because of the dire state of the country’s roads.

IRIN 

The Ngiri-Tumba-Maindombe area in the Democratic Republic of Congo has become the world’s largest Wetland Site of International Importance, officially recognized by the Ramsar Convention. The 6,569,624-hectare site (65,696km²), more than twice the size of Belgium, is situated around the Lake Tumba region in the Central Western Basin of the DRC and contains the largest freshwater body in Africa, the second driest continent. Furthermore its rivers and lakes constitute a major sink for CO2.

Wetlands provide water for drinking and sanitation as well as food, fish, fuel and many raw materials and their total economic value is conservatively estimated to be in excess of $70 billion per year. Support for the DRC government in its effort to win recognition for the Ngiri-Tumba-Maindombe site began in 2004 and was provided jointly by the Central African Regional Program for the Environment (CARPE), a USAID initiative, as well as the Ramsar Convention and WWF, the global conservation organization which was also responsible for the technical aspects of the project.

"WWF is delighted that Ramsar has recognized the importance of this extraordinary wetland and the efforts of the Democratic Republic of Congo to protect it," said James P. Leape, Director General of WWF International. "This is a significant step forward for the welfare of communities who depend on this wetland for their livelihoods and for the wildlife that lives there."

Cassava, sweet potatoes, sugarcane and bananas are all grown in the Ngiri-Tumba-Maindombe site while oil palm plantations, groundnuts and rice are the principal commercial products. Fish from the area also helps to stimulate the economies of big cities such as Kinshasa, Brazzaville and Mbandaka. Vegetation cover at the flood basin acts as a buffer zone against floods for towns all along the Congo River and provides fish with breeding sites, while different forest types help filter water and maintain its quality. It is estimated that, globally, 2.6 billion people lack adequate sanitation services and 1.2 billion people lack access to fresh water.

Until now the world’s largest Ramsar site was Queen Maud Gulf in Canada at 6,278,200 hectares, designated in 1982. The Lake Tumba landscape, encompassing approximately 80,000km2 in total, has one of the highest biodiversity concentrations anywhere in the world. It contains species of conservation concern such as forest elephants, forest buffalo and leopards, there are an estimated 150 species of fish, a wide variety of birds, and three types of crocodile as well as hippopotamus.

Near the centre of the site is Mbandaka, the capital of Equateur province with a population of approximately 750,000, and there are several smaller towns within the site populated by tribes of the Mongo people. Threats to the area’s welfare include illegal logging, fishing and poaching while a decline in water levels in Lake Tumba itself is most probably linked to climate change. Recognition of the site by the Ramsar Convention and the resultant proper management will offer much needed protection from unsustainable activities in future and should ensure the longevity of the water supply.

“The Ngiri-Tumba-Maindombe area contributes to the regulation of flooding and regional climate and ensures that the quality of the water remains good enough for millions of people who depend upon it,” said WWF Project Manager Bila-Isia Inogwabini. “Waters of this zone need to be managed appropriately and the classification of the site will help with a coherent planning process and mobilize all stakeholders to abide by the rules.”

WWF 

Thousands of civilians who fled clashes between the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) forces and militia groups in North Kivu Province are returning home but lack food, a humanitarian official said.

"The food situation is deteriorating and the number of children admitted in the special centres for malnutrition cases has doubled in the last three months," said Olga Miltcheva, spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in the DRC.

Clashes in the Nyamilima area of Rutshuru, 50km north of the capital, Goma, this year have forced at least 40,000 people to flee their homes, according to aid workers. Many sought refuge in other areas within North Kivu and in neighbouring Uganda, living with other families or in internally displaced persons (IDP) camps.

Following a lull, many of the IDPs were now going home.

Miltcheva said the ICRC had distributed at least 680 tonnes of food, along with seeds and farming implements.

"These supplies will [support] their immediate food needs; the seeds will help the people to be self-sufficient as they prepare for the next planting season," she said. The situation, she added, had been aggravated by the bad harvest.

Aid workers were also worried about security for the returnees following reports of militia movements not far from the area of return.

According to Congolese army officials, the militias were suspected to be allied to dissident general Laurent Nkunda's National Congress for the Defence of the Congolese (CNDP).

"These movements by CNDP troops are among several," Colonel Delphin Kahimbi, the deputy army commander in North Kivu, told IRIN. "Nkunda is still recruiting and training people, contrary to the Goma peace accord."

The accord, signed on 23 January in Goma, called for an immediate cessation of hostilities, disengagement of troops and the creation of a buffer zone to separate the parties to the conflict in eastern DRC.
Kahimbi denied reports that the Congolese had recently acquired more ammunition for the army, and delivered it in 10 planes to Goma. "The issue of the planes is a false allegation, the army has not yet taken any decision or step despite the movements and recruitments within the CNDP camps," he added.

The UN Mission in Congo (MONUC) said the reported CNDP movements had not been confirmed.

"At the moment, MONUC does not have information on the movements, but we have information on the recruitments and other violations of the ceasefire accord," Sylvie van Wildenberg, MONUC spokeswoman, said. This, she added, had resulted from "lack of trust between the different parties".

According to aid workers, North Kivu is over-militarised, with up to 50,000 people bearing arms, most of them in the south.

The Congolese army has an estimated 20,000 soldiers in the province, while the armed groups, including the Forces démocratiques pour la libération du Rwanda (FDLR), Mayi-Mayi militiamen and troops loyal to Nkunda, account for the rest.

The FDLR comprises groups of armed Hutu groups, many of them remnants of militias largely blamed for the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, and has been active in eastern DRC for more than a decade.

The UN estimates the violence has forced at least 850,000 people to abandon their homes.

IRIN

The pacification of Ituri, a region in northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) badly affected by conflict, has been a long and arduous process. Much has been achieved over recent years but, as analysts and officials involved point out, the region is not yet out of the woods.

Since the first of three disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (DDR) programmes started in 2004 some 25,000 combatants and 10,000 children have been demobilised. Thousands of weapons have been collected. Programmes have been set up to help former fighters revert to civilian life. Hundreds of thousands of displaced civilians have returned to their homes.

But some small armed groups, splinters of the Front des nationalistes integrationistes (FNI) and of the Forces de résistance patriotique en Ituri (FRPI), did not take part in the latest programme. Since the completion of the third DDR programme in October 2007 several FNI leaders have surrendered, leaving only a few commanders and around 100 men, now considered criminal rather than military threats.

The FRPI, on the other hand, is “reportedly recruiting new combatants and being resupplied with weapons,” according to the latest report on DRC, sent in April 2008, by the UN secretary-general to the Security Council.

The group “maintains an operational capacity that allows it to launch hit-and-run operations against FARDC [The DRC army]. Clashes have halted returns of internally displaced persons in parts of Ituri… The fragile security situation poses a serious threat to the strengthening of community reintegration and recovery processes in some areas of Ituri.,” the report said.

FRPI groups are estimated to comprise some 500 men.

Reintegration problematic

Many of the former fighters who have disarmed, especially children, have not been properly reintegrated into civilian society - and with the authority of the state, in the view of some analysts, yet to be fully restored in Ituri, many civilians still feel a need to keep weapons.

Between 1999 and 2003, Ituri was the theatre of a particularly bloody sideshow of DRC’s wider civil war. Fighting between different communities mobilised into numerous armed groups killed some 50,000 civilians and prompted a large proportion of the region’s population to flee their homes. Access to many areas of Ituri was impossible for humanitarian workers and civilians alike.

The first DDR campaigns may have succeeded in disarming large numbers of these fighters but, as Jonas Mfouatie, who heads the UN’s Development Programme in Ituri, told IRIN, the reintegration component fell short.

“The third phase of the DDR [which UNDP coordinated] has been largely successful but we have about 12,000 ex-combatants from the first and second phases who did not receive anything at all by the time the programme was suspended,” he said in Ituri’s main town, Bunia.

“We know that the government has signed on to resume the programme but this will take time. What happens to these people in the meantime?"

Over recent years many fighters have returned to armed groups because they were not all given the necessary help to resume civilian life.

Improved access

Mfouatie pointed out that thanks to DDR, most parts of Ituri were now accessible and that many civilians were safely able to work their farms, providing a boost to food security.

“The district now has more schools, more shopping centres and health centres, and economic activities have resumed across much of Ituri” he told IRIN.

The UNDP official also explained that the third DDR phase differed from its predecessors in that it included efforts to disarm civilian communities.

“We have adopted a community security approach whereby we conduct a diagnosis to help us identify what the population considers to be the factors of risk for them,” he said. “We call it ‘freedom from fear’.”

According to David Mugnier, the Central Africa project director of the International Crisis Group, which in May 2008 published an extensive report (in French) on Ituri, the third DDR programme (ending in October 2007) was “better conceived in trying to associate communities on the ground, to make them benefit from reinsertion and therefore more inclined to take fighters back.”

“Our assessment is that there is still a lot to be done to disarm local communities,” he added.

Government mistrusted

“People have not surrendered weapons because the level of reconciliation is still very low. This was an inter-communal war from the beginning and people still don’t feel secure. This is largely because the state is still absent in a way.

“Until recently, the security forces, the police and army, were also a source of insecurity. That didn’t inspire people who saw them as enemies, that it was time to disarm,” said Mugnier.

He added that another disincentive to disarm among the Ngiti community, who predominate in the FRPI, was their current ready access to mining resources and their lack of trust in the authorities to manage these properly.

Ituri is rich in resources such as gold, timber, coltan, diamonds and possibly oil.

“The government is notorious for its corruption. There is no vision to establish the management required in a post-conflict situation,” he warned.

Demobilising children

One major challenge of DDR in Ituri is what to do about former child fighters.

During the first two DRR programmes, “no serious study went into establishing exactly what activity would be feasible for such children,” said one humanitarian worker in Bunia who asked not to be identified.
“If one [child] tells you, ‘I want to be a tailor,’ if in his village there are only a few people, after a short while he will run out of a market for his products, then what? He will become susceptible to re-recruitment into the militia groups,” the official said.

“Some militia leaders have said they do not go looking for the children to recruit; the children go to them in search of something to eat and something to occupy them”, he said.

Programmes to reintegrate some 5,000 former child soldiers are now run by the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) working with COOPI (an Italian NGO), Save the Children-UK and local NGOs.

When DDR3 began, far fewer children than expected enrolled for such programmes. “We suspect that instead of letting the children come out through this channel, the militias just chased them away,” Francine Shindano Mangaza, a child protection officer for UNICEF in Bunia, told IRIN.

"As a result, a lot of children just found their way back to the community unofficially. These are the ones that COOPI is now dealing with after an identification process through the help of the local community."

Some 10,000 child soldiers demobilised under the first two DDR programmes have not taken part in any reinsertion projects, in many cases because they have since reached adulthood and therefore become ineligible.

The first suspect to come before the International Criminal Court, Ituri militia leader Thomas Lubanga, faces charges related to the alleged forced recruitment of children, which is considered a war crime under international law.

IRIN

Exaucée Makembi, aged three, has been very weak for three days and sleeps in the arms of her mother, Tina Nzongola, who has taken her to a health centre on the outskirts of Kinshasa.

She is suffering from malaria. The doctor prescribed water-soluble artesunate, but Nzongola complains she does not have the funds to buy it, as it costs around US$5.

Other patients lie on beds next to her - young and old - taking quinine and antibiotics because their cases, according to the nurse, are serious.

“Most of the patients we receive have malaria,” said Baby Bilo, a consultant at another health centre in the area.

The situation is repeated all over the country.

“Today, malaria is the primary cause of sickness and death in the country as it is in Africa, despite the efforts made,” said Yacouba Zina, head of the malaria project of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.

On average, five million cases of malaria, according to him, are registered every year throughout the country with a population of nearly 60 million.

Between 500,000 and one million people die of the disease every year.

However, according to the National Programme for the Struggle against Malaria (PNLP), some success has been noted. “Medicines have been distributed to the sick, insecticide-treated bed nets have been distributed and awareness-raising campaigns have been conducted,” explained the deputy head of the PNLP, Jean Angbalu.

Exaucée Makembi, aged three, has been very weak for three days and sleeps in the arms of her mother, Tina Nzongola, who has taken her to a health centre on the outskirts of Kinshasa.

She is suffering from malaria. The doctor prescribed water-soluble artesunate, but Nzongola complains she does not have the funds to buy it, as it costs around US$5.

Other patients lie on beds next to her - young and old - taking quinine and antibiotics because their cases, according to the nurse, are serious.

“Most of the patients we receive have malaria,” said Baby Bilo, a consultant at another health centre in the area.

The situation is repeated all over the country.

“Today, malaria is the primary cause of sickness and death in the country as it is in Africa, despite the efforts made,” said Yacouba Zina, head of the malaria project of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.

On average, five million cases of malaria, according to him, are registered every year throughout the country with a population of nearly 60 million.

Between 500,000 and one million people die of the disease every year.

However, according to the National Programme for the Struggle against Malaria (PNLP), some success has been noted. “Medicines have been distributed to the sick, insecticide-treated bed nets have been distributed and awareness-raising campaigns have been conducted,” explained the deputy head of the PNLP, Jean Angbalu.

Resistance

“There has been an upward trend in the number of malaria cases and there are also many more of the serious cases because of resistance [to certain drugs used hitherto] owing, among other things, to self-medication,” Zina said.

“And this translates into a high mortality rate among infants, owing to the resistance,” he said.

In addition, said Zina and Angbalu, the new drugs, although sold 10 times cheaper thanks to the partnership with international organisations, were not readily available to most of the population.

Nor has the distribution of bed nets been universal. According to Angbalu, only 35 health zones out of 515 were covered.

But the Global Fund programme envisages covering 120 health zones. Partners, such as the World Bank and the EU, will be able to take on others.

More could be done in terms of prevention, said Zina. Formal education on hygiene issues, or via the media, had not been carried out sufficiently, he said.

“Furthermore, the bed nets given out are insufficient, as they are distributed only to pregnant women and children under five, while other family members are left out and exposed to the disease,” he said.

"Mines and UXOs [unexploded ordnance] are strewn all over the countryside," Francesca Fontanini, external relations officer for the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in DRC, said. "They are among the most pernicious consequences of the armed conflict."

The mines and UXOs, according to the agency, could affect the return and reintegration of an estimated 800,000 people displaced by years of fighting in North Kivu.

They are also a danger to those who may return home to areas with unmapped minefields. Children are particularly vulnerable because some of the weapons look like toys.

"In Dongo, five children who had just [been] repatriated died after a grenade exploded as they were playing with it," Philippe Sondizi Dombale, head of Humanitas Ubangi, a local NGO in Molegbe, northern DRC, told IRIN in the capital Kinshasa.

"Another boy died in Gbadolite after a landmine he had been using for several days as a hammer - out of ignorance - blew up in his face."

More than 892 people have been killed and 1,118 injured by these deadly weapons since 2001, say activists.

The DRC government ratified the global anti-personnel mine ban treaty in 2002, but activists say very little has been done to implement it. And no comprehensive impact surveys have been conducted because of the volatile security situation across the country in addition to logistical difficulties.

"Up to now little has been done ... a choice has to be made [between] the mines continuing to cause casualties and the most urgent thing - to try to stop it," Harouna Ouedraogo, programme director of the UN Mine Action Coordination Centre (UNMACC), said.

The government says work is ongoing to address the plight of victims. "Legislation regarding the rights of victims to assistance is being drawn up," interior minister Denis Kalume said during the International Mine Action Day celebrations on 4 April in Kinshasa.

"A focal point will be created for coordination and we will work closely with our international partners so that national competency in this area can be achieved," he added.

The government, he emphasised, was committed to fulfilling its obligations under the Ottawa (Mine Ban) treaty.

Clean-up programmes

According to Mine Advisory Group (MAG) country director Marc Angibeaud, de-mining efforts through international NGOs such as MAG, Handicap International and DanChurchAid, have cleared the countryside of thousands of anti-personnel mines and UXO, especially in Equateur, Maniema, Katanga and South Kivu provinces.

Work has also been done by the commercial de-mining company, Mechem.

From June 2007 to January 2008, more than 28,000 sqkm of land was cleared; over 3,500 weapons, 5,000 UXO and 35,000 items of ammunition destroyed, and mine education sessions conducted for over 10,000 people. De-miners have also been trained.

"Clearance activities have not only prevented accidents from explosions but also freed land for agriculture and rendered safe many roads and a water source crucial to the villagers’ daily activities," MAG noted in a 31 January statement.

"The destruction of the ammunition also means it will not be available for trafficking - a significant problem in the Great Lakes region - thus contributing to regional peace-building."

Another NGO, Synergie pour la Lutte Anti Mines (SYLAM), is teaching internally displaced persons (IDPs) and refugees in North Kivu how to spot half-buried or fully exposed explosive devices and what to do.

SYLAM has recorded 111 deaths and 127 injuries caused by these weapons in North Kivu since 2003 - though none yet inside IDP camps. Together with the UNMACC and other NGOs, it has identified 51 polluted sites.

Ouedraogo, however, said the achievements so far were merely the tip of the iceberg. As long as much of the country remained inaccessible and the people remained poor and ignorant, the problem would prevail. There were reports, for example, of some people using the explosives for fishing.

According to the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), both rebel and government forces used anti-personnel mines during the DRC’s numerous conflicts. There have been no reports of use of anti-personnel mines by government forces, however, since the DRC signed the landmine treaty.

Since May 2006, an increasing number of small arms and ammunition, UXO and mines have been handed over to authorities. From 2003 to May 2006, some 2,244 mines were destroyed.

But the problem remains huge. Surveys by DanChurchAid covering 153,000 sqkm in Katanga, So uth Kivu and Maniema, for example, found 171 mined and 583 UXO-contaminated areas.

De-mining is an expensive business and in DRC, where infrastructure is lacking, it becomes even more difficult.

The UN Mission in Congo (MONUC) says work has been slowed down by several key challenges - survey and mapping sites, provision of adequate assistance to victims, awareness-raising and the creation of mine legislation. As a result, landmines and UXOs continue to hamper economic development, and maim and kill hundreds in the vast country every year.

"Millions in the DRC continue to live with the daily fear of being killed or disabled," Ross Mountain, Deputy Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General in the DRC, said on 4 April. "Much has been done, but a lot of challenges remain.

In Goma, on the eastern side of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), at least 70 people, according to officials, have died because of a plane crash yesterday.

VOA has reported that as many as 100 people could have been on board the plane at the time of its crash.

A director of Hewa Bora Airways, the airline involved in the incident said that "we [the airline] have managed to save most of the passengers who have been evacuated to hospitals."

Naomi Schwarz, a journalist on the scene described the incident. "The whole top of the plane is ripped off and the two buildings next door are pretty much destroyed too. People are carrying buckets full of water to try to put out the fire. Just buckets they found on the streets," she said.

As of 08:00 UTC, the majority of the Hewa Bora website was not available.

A Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) human rights group has said mass graves with human remains have been found in the southwestern Bas-Congo Province where security forces recently clashed with followers of a religious sect.

"The most recent of these graves, containing the remains of 20 bodies, was discovered on 31 March in Materne, between Boma and Matadi towns," Amigo Gonde, coordinator of the NGO, African Association for Human Rights (Asadho), told IRIN.

"The other two graves - discovered further away and several days earlier - contained some 30 bodies."

Gonde, who demanded an independent inquiry, said one of the graves had apparently been dug up. "The grave at Materne had been dug up by unidentified persons and its contents taken to an unknown place, but there are indications to suggest the bodies were indeed there," he said.

DRC authorities could not be reached immediately for comment, but aid workers in the region said they were aware of the claims and were investigating.

Civilians in the area said a doctor in a rural health clinic, who first spotted one of the graves, had been questioned by local authorities.

"Justin Mabiala Ma Mabiala - who is the chief doctor of the rural health zone - was questioned for divulging a professional secret," according to a statement issued by another local human rights NGO, Voice of the Voiceless.

The remains, the NGO quoted local residents as saying, were suspected to be those of Bundu Dia Kongo sect followers because shreds of cloth and flags used by its members were found at the site.

Gonde denounced a continuing crackdown on the sect, saying security personnel were trying to apprehend some followers who had escaped into nearby forests.

Scores of people were killed in February and March during clashes between police and followers of Bundu Dia Kongo, which is contesting state authority. Aid workers said many others were wounded - some of whom sought treatment at various health facilities.

Aid workers said they saw empty villages with razed homes and that some of the wounded were forced to flee health centres. Some of the victims of violence were hit by stray bullets when they fled.

Bundu Dia Kongo’s spiritual leader and national assembly deputy, Ne Mwanda Nsemi, said he would initiate international judicial proceedings against “the massacre” of his members.

The sect is seeking to emancipate traditional African or Congolese culture and demands the restoration of the former Kingdom of the Congo. It has set up tribunals to try citizens who break the law and has its own police force. Occasionally they lower the national flag to hoist their own.

A Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) human rights group has said mass graves with human remains have been found in the southwestern Bas-Congo Province where security forces recently clashed with followers of a religious sect.

"The most recent of these graves, containing the remains of 20 bodies, was discovered on 31 March in Materne, between Boma and Matadi towns," Amigo Gonde, coordinator of the NGO, African Association for Human Rights (Asadho), told IRIN.

"The other two graves - discovered further away and several days earlier - contained some 30 bodies."

Gonde, who demanded an independent inquiry, said one of the graves had apparently been dug up. "The grave at Materne had been dug up by unidentified persons and its contents taken to an unknown place, but there are indications to suggest the bodies were indeed there," he said.

DRC authorities could not be reached immediately for comment, but aid workers in the region said they were aware of the claims and were investigating.

Civilians in the area said a doctor in a rural health clinic, who first spotted one of the graves, had been questioned by local authorities.

"Justin Mabiala Ma Mabiala - who is the chief doctor of the rural health zone - was questioned for divulging a professional secret," according to a statement issued by another local human rights NGO, Voice of the Voiceless.

The remains, the NGO quoted local residents as saying, were suspected to be those of Bundu Dia Kongo sect followers because shreds of cloth and flags used by its members were found at the site.

Gonde denounced a continuing crackdown on the sect, saying security personnel were trying to apprehend some followers who had escaped into nearby forests.

Scores of people were killed in February and March during clashes between police and followers of Bundu Dia Kongo, which is contesting state authority. Aid workers said many others were wounded - some of whom sought treatment at various health facilities.

Aid workers said they saw empty villages with razed homes and that some of the wounded were forced to flee health centres. Some of the victims of violence were hit by stray bullets when they fled.

Bundu Dia Kongo’s spiritual leader and national assembly deputy, Ne Mwanda Nsemi, said he would initiate international judicial proceedings against “the massacre” of his members.

The sect is seeking to emancipate traditional African or Congolese culture and demands the restoration of the former Kingdom of the Congo. It has set up tribunals to try citizens who break the law and has its own police force. Occasionally they lower the national flag to hoist their own.

IRIN

The ICRC has been stepping up its humanitarian activities in response to escalation of the conflict in eastern parts of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) during the latter part of last year.

In spite of the hopes generated by the Goma Peace Conference in January this year, the lack of security has continued to have a devastating impact on civilians in many parts of North and South Kivu.

To finance the increase in activities, the ICRC is asking donors for an additional eight million Swiss francs, bringing its total 2008 budget for the DRC to 45 million francs (more than 46 million US dollars).

"The current insecurity is mainly due to skirmishes between armed groups and attacks on the civilian population, marked by a high number of violations of international humanitarian law," says Max Hadorn, head of the ICRC delegation in Kinshasa. "Without improved security, people displaced by the fighting and the violence will not be able to return home."

The ICRC plans to work with the Red Cross Society of the DRC to provide more than 37,000 displaced people with food for three months and to distribute essential household items to 115,000 displaced people. It also aims at distributing seed and agricultural tools to 30,000 civilians returning home and 10,000 households hosting displaced families, to allow them to grow sufficient food.

The organization will also continue to provide surgical expertise and additional medical supplies to hospitals treating the wounded, and to expand its support to victims of sexual violence. It will also dedicate additional resources to providing clean water in areas that have received a large influx of displaced people.

The ICRC will continue to document allegations of violations of international humanitarian law. The organization discusses these bilaterally with military authorities and armed groups with a view to ending violations, urging the various parties to protect civilians. It will maintain contact with all parties to the conflict, to remind them of their obligation to protect and respect the physical safety of civilians, the wounded and people detained in connection with the fighting.

As part of its efforts to accomplish this, the ICRC will continue to visit detainees and to help people separated by the conflict, in particular children and former child soldiers.

International Committee of the Red Cross