(JED/IFEX) – “Don’t you know that soldiers eat human flesh and that the weapons they have are for killing people like you? Get out of my office! And you will see!” Such were the words used on 14 August 2000 in Kananga by a Zimbabwean colonel, otherwise unidentified, in his office with regard to Joli-Ambroise […]
(JED/IFEX) – “Don’t you know that soldiers eat human flesh and that the weapons they have are for killing people like you? Get out of my office! And you will see!” Such were the words used on 14 August 2000 in Kananga by a Zimbabwean colonel, otherwise unidentified, in his office with regard to Joli-Ambroise Musuet, coordinator of the private station Kasai Horizons Radio-Television (KHRT) and permanent correspondent for the newspaper “La Référence Plus” in the province of western Kasai (central region of the Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC).
The threats from this officer followed the denunciation by KHRT of the behaviour of Zimbabwean soldiers at a military roadblock set up on a road in the town of Mwamba-Mbuyi, 30 kilometres from the city of Kananga, the principal city in western Kasai.
According to information obtained by JED, on 12 August, journalists from KHRT who were covering the national vaccination campaign against polio were taken out of their broadcasting van by Zimbabwean soldiers at the above-mentioned roadblock. These soldiers humiliated the journalists, forcing them, without explanation, to roll around in the dust.
Some 11,000 Zimbabwean soldiers have been present in the DRC since the beginning of the war in this country, in order to support government troops which are fighting against rebel factions supported by Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi.
