DRC ARMY TARGETS HEALTH CLINIC
Nov 10th, 2009 by admin
The Democratic Republic of Congo army is using vaccination clinics to attract and attack thousands of ethnic Hutu civilians, according to aid agency Medecins Sans Frontières (MSF). The head of MSF programmes in Central Africa, Luis Encinas, said soldiers raided seven clinics in North Kivu as a massive vaccination campaign to combat measles epidemics had started. The sites in Ngomashi and Kimua zones were controlled by Hutu rebel group, Forces Democratiques de Liberation du Rwanda (FDLR), but all parties of the conflict had given security guarantees to ensure MSF could run its activities. Encinas said the attacks by the DRC army were an unacceptable abuse of humanitarian aid for military purposes. The United Nations withdrew its support for the DRC army last week after finding information about soldiers deliberately targeting civilians in the region.
