GREAT LAKES: IRIN-CEA Update 1,045
DRC: RCD reported to have recaptured Pepa
The rebel Rassemblement congolais pour democratie (RCD-Goma) on Wednesday
recaptured the town of Pepa, in Katanga province, according to South Kivu
governor Norbert Basengezi, quoted by the BBC on Thursday. RCD troops
killed 35 government soldiers and seized "a lot of weapons", including
army vehicles, he said. No one was killed on the RCD side, according to
Basengezi, but the BBC quoted independent sources as saying that three RCD
soldiers were killed and five others injured. The governor said the
government had continued to violate the Lusaka agreement by attacking
areas under RCD control in Kivu, Katanga and Kasai. The Forces armees
congolaises (FAC) had seized control of Pepa and Moba last month, and a
Rwandan-led counter-attack had not been unexpected, according to
diplomatic sources. Basengezi also alleged that Rwandan and Burundian
refugees had "divided" the Congolese, destroyed the environment and
contributed in the spread of AIDS in the Kivus, the BBC added.
There was now fear that Katanga fighting could derail the so-called Maputo
process - a parallel to the Lusaka peace initiative arising from the
face-to-face meeting of Kabila and his allies, and senior Ugandan and
Rwandan leaders on the other, in the Mozambican capital in mid-October -
before it had got fully underway, diplomatic sources told IRIN.
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