227/99 Democratic Republic of Congo / Burundi,
Rwanda, Uganda
Summary of Facts
1. On 8th March 1999, the Secretariat of the African Commission received from Mr Léonard She Okitundu,
Minister of Human Rights of the Democratic Republic of Congo, a letter with Reference No
CABMIN/MDH/MM/201/MZ/99, dated 24th February 1999, a communication presented on behalf of the
Congolese government based on the provisions of Article 49 of the Charter.
2. The communication is filed against the Republics of Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda (hereinafter referred
to, respectively, as 'Burundi', 'Rwanda' and 'Uganda'). It alleges grave and massive violations of human and
peoples' rights committed by the armed forces of these three countries in the Congolese provinces where
there have been rebel activities since 2nd August 1998, and for which the Democratic Republic of Congo
blames Burundi, Uganda and Rwanda. In support of its complaint the Democratic Republic of Congo states
that the Ugandan and Rwandan governments have acknowledged the presence of their respective armed
forces in the eastern provinces of the Democratic Republic of Congo under what it terms the 'fallacious
pretext' of 'safeguarding their interests'. The complaint states, furthermore, that the Congolese government
has 'sufficient and overwhelming evidence of Burundi's involvement'.
3. In particular, the Democratic Republic of Congo asserts that on Monday, 3rd August 1998, thirty-eight
(38) officers and about [one hundred] (100) men of the Congolese forces were assassinated, after being
disarmed, at Kavumu airport, Bukavu, in the Congolese province of South Kivu. Relatedly, on Tuesday, 4th
August 1998, over fifty (50) corpses were buried in Bukavu, about twenty (20) of them near the fuel station
at the Nyamwera market, opposite Ibanda mosque. Other corpses (mostly civilians) were found at the
military camp called 'Sa?o camp' in Bukavu. On 17th August 1998, the Rwandan and Ugandan forces who
had been on Congolese territory for many weeks, besieged Inga hydroelectric dam, in Lower Congo
province, a wholly civilian facility. The presence of these forces disrupted the lives of millions of people and
the economic life of the Democratic Republic of Congo. It also caused the death of many patients including
children in hospitals, due to the cutting off of electricity supply to incubated operating theatres and other
respiratory equipment.
4. On Monday, 24th August 1998, over eight hundred and fifty-six (856) persons were massacred in Kasika,
in Lwindi chiefdom, and Mwenga. The bodies found over a distance of sixty kilometres (60 km) from
Kilungutwe to Kasika (in South Kivu province) were mainly those of women and children. The women had
been raped before being killed by their murderers, who slashed them open from the vagina up to the
abdomen and cut them up with daggers. On 2nd September 1998, in a bid to ambush the men of the
Congolese army based in Kamituga, the Rwandan and Ugandan forces in Kitutu village massacred thirteen
(13) people. On 6th October 1998, forty-eight (48) civilians were killed in Lubarika village. In Uvira town, on
the banks of Lake Tanganyika, a massacre of the population including intellectuals and other able-bodied
persons took place. This was partly evidenced by the discovery of three hundred and twenty-six (326)
bodies in Rushima river, near Luberizi. Five hundred and forty-seven (547) bodies were also discovered
buried in a mass grave at Bwegera, and one hundred and thirty-eight (138) others were found in a
butcher's shop in Luvingi village. From 30th December 1998 to 1st January 1999, six hundred and twelve
(612) persons were massacred in Makobola, South Kivu province. All these atrocities were committed by
the Rwandan and Ugandan forces which invaded territories of the Democratic Republic of Congo,
according to the complaint of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
5. The Democratic Republic of Congo also claims that the forces of Rwanda and Uganda aimed at
spreading sexually transmitted diseases and committing rape. To this end, about two thousand (2000)
AIDS suffering or HIV-positive Ugandan soldiers were sent to the front in the eastern province of Congo
with the mission of raping girls and women so as to propagate an AIDS pandemic among the local
population and, thereby, decimate it. The Democratic Republic of Congo notes that 75% of the Ugandan
army are suffering from AIDS. A white paper annexed to the communication enumerates many cases of
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