KINSHASA — Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Monday urged the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo to arrest former rebel leader Bosco Ntaganda, so that he can face trial for alleged war crimes.
The plea came the day before two Congolese militia leaders appear before the International Criminal Court in The Hague, charged with crimes against humanity and war crimes for a massacre of more than 200 civilians in 2003.
Their trial "draws attention to the case of Ntaganda, the remaining Congolese suspect sought by the ICC," which issued an arrest warrant for him in 2006, the New York-based non-governmental organisation said in a statement.
Ntaganda, ex-head of general staff of the Tutsi rebel National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP), is accused of war crimes, notably enlisting child soldiers in 2002-2003 in the northeastern Ituri region, when he was in the militia of ther Union of Congolese Patriots.
Since 2009, he has joined the government side and been taken into the army with the rank of general. Officially responsible for the integration into the Congolese army (FARDC) of former CNDP rebels, Ntaganda is in practice the second-in-command of a campaign waged against Rwandan Hutu rebels in eastern DR Congo since March.
HRW said that "in November 2008, he commanded an attack on the town of Kiwanja in North Kivu province where an estimated 150 civilians were killed." Two months later, he was made an army general.
"Allowing alleged war criminals such as Bosco Ntaganda to lead troops only gives a green light to him and others to continue their attacks on civilians," said Param-Preet Singh, a counsel with HRW's international justice programme.
"The Congolese government should arrest Ntaganda, as it did the other Ituri warlords," Singh added.
On Tuesday, Ituri militia leaders Germain Katanga and Mathieu Ngudjolo go on trial at the ICC. Another, Thomas Lubanga, has been on trial before the ICC since January 26.
Kinshasa currently refuses to arrest Ntaganda, on the grounds that "peace and security come before anything else," particularly in the embattled east of the country, as President Joseph Kabila said last February.
Copyright © 2009 AFP
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