Credit: Guerchom Ndebo/Getty Images
STOCKHOLM / ROME, Mar 10 2021 (IPS) - On the morning of 22nd February a jeep from the
World Food Programme (WFP), followed by another one with the Italian ambassador, Luca Anastasio, was driving along
Route Nationale 2 passing by The Virunga National Park, an
UNESCO Congolese World Heritage Site famous for its dwindling population of unique mountain gorillas.
A perilous voyage, not only due to tomb-deep potholes, but especially the presence of various, extremely dangerous, armed criminals. Since most people in the area are poor it is quite common that children and women are abducted in groups, to make a joint ransom worth while. However, a foreigner (humanitarian worker, or occasional tourist venturing to spot gorillas in the National Park), or a medical doctor, may provide a more substantial ransom. To release a physician Congolese kidnappers have been paid up to ten thousand USD. This might be a reason to why the WFP logo painted on the
Denis Mukwege (1955-)
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How DRC s colonial legacy forged a nexus between ethnicity, territory and conflict - Democratic Republic of the Congo
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Throughout history, ethnic stereotypes have been used to justify mass violence, exclusion, oppression, and inequality in many corners of the world. In times of violent upheaval and conflict, ethnic narratives often come to the fore. This is true even when the origin and the stakes have little to do with ethnicity. This colours people’s understanding of the conflict’s stakes and fault-lines.
In such moments, people may start to think of conflicts in ethnic terms. They may begin to attribute certain cultural, or genetic, characteristics of their adversaries as the cause for conflict. A perceived ethnic adversary may be regarded as “violent”, “aggressive”, “greedy, savage”, “rebellious”, “restless”, “backwards”, “undemocratic” or “cunning”. This makes it easier to cast them as a threat to one’s own ethnic community.
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The ADF is one of more than 100 militias that plague the eastern provinces of the vast country and has been blamed for the deaths of hundreds of civilians over the past year.
Twenty-five people have been killed in a suspected militia attack in the eastern DR Congo region of Beni, where hundreds have died in violence since November, a local official said Wednesday, blaming the attack on the notorious ADF militia.
The army was chasing ADF fighters on Thursday when they found the bodies of 25 civilians, who had been taken by surprise in their fields on New Year s Eve, Donat Kibuana, the administrator of the Beni territory, told AFP.