La Voix des Sans Voix (VSV) one of the oldest human rights organization in DRC has reported that 16 former rebels have died from a camp after several months of lack of access to basic food.
The organization said the prisoners living at CETA camp in the capital Kinshasa include those former combatants demobilized from Kitona under the Program for Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (UEPN-DDR).
According to VSV, some deaths and indicates that these ex-combatants live without drinking water, food, less sleeping bags, or sanitary facilities. It calls on the Congolese Government in particular to monitor the situation of these demobilized persons. They do not have the right of access to health care and sleep in tents on old pieces of cardboard.
Furthermore the NGO implores the government that these demobilized persons have the right to human dignity, considers that the abandonment and the failure to take charge of the latter may discourage other people belonging to the armed groups operating to leave him in the DRC in order to integrate the DDR process, focusing on peace.
It is since November 2019 that the aforementioned, previously numbering two hundred and sixty-seven (267), arrived in Kinshasa from the military base of Kitona, province of Kongo Central for their repatriation and reintegration into their respective provinces.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo's (DRC) disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (DDR) program had been lauded as a key process that would bring peace and security to the eastern DRC, and sustainable stability in the African Great Lakes region.
In 2013, MONUSCO's new Force Intervention Brigade (FIB) and the DRC national army, Forces armées de la République Démocratique du Congo (FARDC), launched an attack on the armed group Mouvement du 23 Mars (M23). The defeat of this rebel group influenced several other rebel groups to surrender, disarm and join the third phase of the DDR program (DDR III).
Established in 2013 by the DRC government, the DDR III program was officially launched in 2015. There are more than 4 800 ex-combatants (out of a targeted 12 205 combatants, dependants and communities) in the demobilisation camps.
Tensions recently escalated in the demobilisation camps due to poor living conditions. Ex-combatants protested that they were still based in the camps, despite having completed their training courses. The relocation process was suspended in June 2016 due to a lack of financial resources from partners.
Source : https://taarifa.rw/16-demobilised-rebels-starved-to-death-at-ceta-camp-in-drc/
