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UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs

DRC: Ituri militias again agree to cantonment

NAIROBI, 10 October 2003 (IRIN) - Militias in Ituri District of northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) agreed on Thursday to the cantonment of their forces, a promise they have made on previous occasions.

The announcement followed the fifth meeting of a consultation committee of armed groups in the region, known as the Comite de Concertation des Groupes Armes, which was held under the aegis of the UN Mission in the DRC, known as MONUC.

In a statement, MONUC said on Friday that the militias agreed to provide within 10 days technical information regarding their numbers and locations, with a view to their cantonment. MONUC said the cantonment would take place in tandem with the deployment of its Ituri Brigade from Bunia, the main town of Ituri, to locations throughout the district.

MONUC said that all armed groups of the region - namely, the Union des Patriotes Congolais, the Front des Nationalistes Integrationnistes, the Forces Armees Populaires du Congo, the Parti pour l'Unite et la Sauvegarde de l'Integrite du Congo and the Forces Populaires pour la Democratie au Congo - participated in the meeting.

MONUC said the meeting enabled a "constructive exchange" among the militias and a delegation of the DRC's three month-old unity government, during which representatives from Kinshasa, the national capital, briefed militias on the two-year transitional process currently underway and on country-wide efforts toward disarmament, demobilisation, and reinsertion of combatants.

Militia leaders called on MONUC, in its capacity as coordinator of the International Committee to Accompany the Transition (known by its French acronym, CIAT), to promote their inclusion in the transitional national government. They also asked that MONUC's Ituri Brigade be deployed across the district as soon as possible.

CIAT comprises ambassadors accredited to the DRC, meeting under the presidency of William Swing, the UN Secretary-General's special representative to the DRC, and head of MONUC.

For its part, MONUC recalled that militias were still actively engaged in armed activities, and demanded that they commit themselves to the peace process.

[See earlier IRIN stories, "Ituri factions recommit themselves to peace" and "Ituri militias agree to disarm, verify ceasefire"]

Themes: (IRIN) Conflict

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