First published  at  e-activist.com

Arrest Guidon and His Abusive Commanders; Investigate Army Backers

(Goma, October 20, 2020) – Congolese authorities have not arrested a rebel commander wanted for multiple crimes under a June 2019 warrant even as his forces have continued to carry out summary killings, rapes and sexual slavery, extortion, and forced recruitment of children, Human Rights Watch said today.

Congolese judicial authorities on June 7, 2019 issued the warrant for the militia leader, Guidon Shimiray Mwissa (known as Guidon), for participating in an insurrection, recruiting child soldiers, and committing the crime against humanity of rape in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. The authorities also have not provided survivors of sexual violence adequate assistance. Congolese authorities should enforce the arrest warrant and bring to justice Congolese army officers found to have assisted him.

“A 2019 arrest warrant has not stopped Guidon from committing horrific abuses against civilians in areas he controls,” said Thomas Fessy, senior Congo researcher at Human Rights Watch. “His backers within the Congolese army should be investigated and prosecuted for using an abusive group as a proxy force.”

Guidon commands a faction of the Nduma Defense of Congo-Rénové (NDC-R), which until it split in July 2020, controlled more territory than any other armed group in eastern Congo. It was effectively in administrative control of much of Walikale, Lubero, Masisi, and Rutshuru territories in North Kivu – an area roughly the size of neighboring Rwanda. Human Rights Watch has not been able to identify any attempt by Congolese authorities or United Nations peacekeepers to arrest Guidon. Instead, there is evidence that elements of the Congolese army have been collaborating with the NDC-R. However, since the group split into two factions in July, Congolese troops have carried out military operations against Guidon’s forces and say they are seeking to arrest him.

Between January 2016 and September 2020, Human Rights Watch interviewed more than 100 people, including victims and witnesses of attacks in all four territories, former child soldiers, Congolese security sources, UN staff, and local activists. Human Rights Watch also analyzed and authenticated a trove of footage filmed by local residents with undisclosed cameras showing abuses by NDC-R fighters and evidence of collaboration between the Congolese army and the NDC-R. Given the large scale of the abuses and the remoteness of the areas where the NDC-R has been operating, this research covers only a fraction of the abuses committed.

Since 2014, NDC-R forces have killed dozens of men, women, and children in those four territories, many of them hacked to death with machetes or shot. During attacks, fighters looted and burned houses, and tortured men and women with knives and machetes, said witnesses and victims, including former child soldiers.

In January, NDC-R fighters detained about 12 people at a banana plantation in Rutshuru territory. “[The fighters] made us sit together and started to cut us with machetes,” a 17-year-old boy said. At least two men were killed.

NDC-R fighters have also committed widespread sexual violence against women and girls, including rapes and sexual slavery. Women and girls described being raped, in some instances while being beaten, stabbed with knives, or tied up. Some survivors said they were raped repeatedly, in some instances by several fighters.

Human Rights Watch documented 15 cases of rape, of 11 women and 4 girls, and heard reliable accounts of scores of other cases. A 14-year-old girl from Masisi territory described being raped by an NDC-R fighter while returning from the fields in early 2020: “He took me and pushed me on the ground. He said, ‘If you refuse, I will shoot you in the stomach.’”

NDC-R fighters have also forcibly recruited scores of young men and boys and imposed forced labor and illegal “taxes” on people living in areas under their control. People who did not comply or failed to pay were kidnapped, severely beaten, and ill-treated while detained in underground pits at NDC-R bases. Since the arrest warrant was issued, the Kivu Security Tracker – a joint project by Human Rights Watch and the New York University-based Congo Research Group – found that NDC-R forces killed about a hundred civilians.

Guidon, 40, is an ethnic Nyanga and former government soldier from Walikale territory who defected in 2007 to become a rebel fighter. Shortly thereafter, he joined the Nduma Defense of Congo (NDC) under Ntabo Ntaberi Sheka. In 2014, Guidon broke away from Sheka and established the NDC-R. Sheka surrendered to the authorities in 2017 and was charged with mass rape, murder, pillaging, recruiting child soldiers, and torture. His trial took place before a military court in Goma, which has yet to deliver its verdict. Human Rights Watch has previously documented serious abuses by Sheka’s forces.

In January 2018, the UN Security Council added Guidon to the UN sanctions list, freezing his assets and imposing a worldwide travel ban. Reports by the UN Group of Experts and the Congo Research Group, along with videos obtained by Human Rights Watch, have shown that Congolese army units have continued to support and collaborate with the NDC-R, from planning military operations to providing the group with arms and ammunition.

A Congolese army spokesman in North Kivu told Human Rights Watch by phone in October that government troops were “actively seeking to arrest Guidon.” “We want to get him alive so we can hand him over to face justice,” said Maj. Guillaume Njike Kaiko. “We have seen no evidence but if army officers were found to have collaborated with the [NDC-R] group, they will be handed over to the competent authorities because that would be against the army’s mission.”

The Congolese government should step up efforts to arrest Guidon and end his capacity to commit abuses, Human Rights Watch said. Congo’s international partners should publicly and privately urge the administration of President Felix Tshisekedi to act.

Under article 190 of Congo’s constitution, supporting non-state armed groups amounts to high treason. In February 2013, 11 African countries signed the Peace, Security and Cooperation Framework for the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Region in Addis Ababa, in which they agreed not to tolerate or provide support to armed groups. Congolese authorities should investigate the sources of support to the abusive NDC-R forces – whatever the faction – and act to stop it. Military commanders implicated should be suspended and appropriately disciplined or prosecuted.

“Congolese commanders have helped Guidon’s rebels control vast swathes of territory despite killing civilians, raping women and girls, and causing massive displacement,” Fessy said. “The Congolese authorities not only need to shut down Guidon, but also all those military officers who have kept him from justice.”

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For more information, please contact:
In London, Thomas Fessy (English, French): +44-7-477-96-91-54 (mobile); or fessyt@hrw.org. Twitter: @thfessy
In New York, Lewis Mudge (English, French): +1-646-637-3801 (mobile); or mudgel@hrw.org. Twitter: @LewisMudge
In New York, Ida Sawyer (English, French): +1-917-213-0939 (mobile); or sawyeri@hrw.org. Twitter: @ida_sawyer