[ 2012-07-29 ]

US in major policy shift in Rwanda, experts say
WASHINGTON (AFP) - Washington is loosening its
ties to Rwandan President Paul Kagame, long a
favorite of the donor community, amid allegations
his government is stirring violence in neighboring
DR Congo, analysts say.

Last week, in a statement slipped out without
fanfare late Sunday, the United States said it was
freezing its modest $200,000 in 2012 military aid
to Rwanda -- a move experts say represents a major
shift in long-held US policy.

"As we have repeatedly said to the government of
Rwanda, we have deep concerns about Rwanda's
support to the Congolese rebel group that goes by
the name M23," State Department spokeswoman
Victoria Nuland said.

The M23 are Tutsi ex-rebels from the Rwanda-backed
National Congress for the Defense of the People
(CNDP).

They were integrated into the regular army of the
Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2009 as part
of a peace deal that followed their failed 2008
offensive on the Congo's eastern city of Goma.

But the ex-rebels mutinied in April, demanding
better pay and the full implementation of a March
23, 2009 peace deal, and have been engaged in
running battles with the Congolese army in the
eastern Nord Kivu region.

Kinshasa accuses Kigali of sponsoring the
rebellion -- a complaint supported by a UN panel,
which said in June that Rwanda was supplying the
rebels with arms and soldiers.

Nuland said the United States also has its own
evidence of Rwandan involvement in the upheavals,
but believed the UN report was "quite
comprehensive and quite concerning."

US State Department war crimes investigator
Stephen Rapp even told the British daily The
Guardian this week that Kagame could one day find
himself charged with war crimes. The Netherlands
also cut its military aid to Rwanda.

"It is really the first time we have heard strong
words spoken against Paul Kagame in Rwanda by the
US government. There is a real shift," said
Richard Downie, expert at the Center for Strategic
and International Studies.

"This is a real change in tone. Rwanda will find
itself in a unusual and uncomfortable position
right now," he told AFP.

Since Kagame took up the reins of power of his
African nation in 1994 ending a bloody genocide
which left some 800,000, mainly Tutsis, dead,
Rwanda "has been the darling of donors' community
for so long," Downie said.

Former British prime minister Tony Blair is a
special advisor to Kagame, and has been a
steadfast supporter of Rwanda's development
through his Africa Governance Initiative.

But the winds began to change in June with the
publication of the United Nations report.

Even if the amount of aid was small "there are
other signs of unhappiness by the United States,"
Downie said. "I am told that the head of the
Africom postponed a visit to Rwanda and also some
people are making some noise that Rwanda wants to
get a seat on the UN Security Council."

John Campbell, from the Council on Foreign
Relations, said: "The report the UN experts
produced provided a clear evidence of Rwandan
meddling in Eastern Congo. It is a careful and
credible report.

"It has long been US policy to oppose outside
intervention in Eastern Congo. In light of the UN
report, the Obama administration had to respond."

Rwanda has categorically denied that it is
interfering in the DR Congo, accusations which
Kagame told CNN were "not true" and "actually
ridiculous."

"You see, I hope people can just be fair. It's not
even very complicated. I'm really surprised people
called experts can make a report this way."

There have long been tensions between Rwanda and
the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Rwanda has been accused on several occasions of
aiding Tutsi forces in DR Congo to combat Hutu
rebels on its western border. It charges the Hutu
rebels with joining the 1994 genocide and says
they remain a threat to their country.

Kigali sent troops into the DR Congo from
1996-1997 and then between 1998 to 2002, before
moving to act through proxy militias, experts
say.

Nuland insisted: "We are continuing to watch this
case very carefully and to send public and private
messages to the government of Rwanda."

French journalist and expert on the region, Pierre
Pean, told AFP the US decision could mark a major
shift in regional policy.

It could "perhaps signal the beginning of the end
for the soldier Kagame and his license to kill and
pillage since 1994 as well as a revision of
American policy in the Great Lakes region," he
said.

Source - AFP

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