Kidnapping Spurs Fresh Call to End Impunity in DR Congo

[cory777]

Source: Inter Press Service

KINSHASA, Sep 13, 2010 (IPS) - Civil society is calling for an end to impunity for the harassment of human rights activists in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The renewed call comes as an activist kidnapped at the end of August have described their detention and torture by uniformed captors.

Bwira Kyahi, president of civil society in Masisi, a town in the province of North Kivu, and another human rights advocate, Balisi Kapumba, who works as an organizer with the NGO Solidarity Action for Peace and Development, were kidnapped during the last week of August in Goma. Kyahi was found Aug. 30, 2010.

"I was tortured for seven days by men in uniform without being told what the charges were against me," Kyahi told IPS. Another member of civil society in Masisi, who requested anonymity, said: "Bwira has been receiving phone threats since July 30, 2010 after publishing an open letter that civil society wrote to Joseph Kabila, calling into question insecurity levels in Masisi caused by armed members of the CNDP." The CNDP is the French acronym for the National Congress for People's Defense), a former rebel group that was at one time led by General Bosco Ntaganda, who is today a senior commander in the Congolese army, the FARDC.

The kidnapping of Kyahi and Kapumba occurred less than three months after the assassination of Floribert Chebeya, former executive secretary of the NGO Voice of the Voiceless for Human Rights (VSV), who was killed in the night of Jun. 1 in the capital, Kinshasa.

Read more: http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=52811

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