A moins de trois mois de l’élection présidentielle en République centrafricaine (RCA), l’Expert indépendant de l’ONU sur la situation des droits de l’homme dans ce pays, Yao Agbetse, a fait part de son inquiétude sur les agitations de certains groupes armés qui entravent la bonne marche des inscriptions sur la liste électorale. Publié par ONU Info le 2 octobre 2020. Des électeurs Voters à un bureau de vote pendant les élections de décembre 2015 en Centrafrique (MINUSCA) La République centrafricaine (RCA) se prépare au premier tour du scrutin présidentiel fixé au 27 décembre 2020. « La tenue des élections dans les échéances constitutionnelles doit être un objectif impératif à atteindre, comme l’avait souligné le Secrétaire général des Nations Unies », a déclaré vendredi Yao Agbetse devant le Conseil des droits de l’homme. Lors d’une réunion de haut-niveau sur la RCA organisée à l’ONU la veille, António Guterres avait rappelé que les autorités centrafricaines et toutes les parties prenantes nationales ont une « responsabilité historique dans le bon déroulement de ces élections ». L’expert indépendant onusien redoute qu’un éventuel décalage du calendrier électoral, qui ne reposerait pas sur une concertation nationale, puisse « engendrer des troubles ». Un tel scénario pourrait « menacer l’ordre public et entrainer des violations des droits de l’homme et du droit international humanitaire », a-t-il prévenu. Devant le Conseil des droits de l’homme, M. Agbetse a indiqué que la RCA n’a pas besoin, dans le contexte actuel, « d’une période d’incertitude porteuse potentiellement de violations des droits de l’homme et du droit international humanitaire ». Il est d’avis que du respect du calendrier prévu, du caractère libre, transparent et inclusif des élections, ainsi que de l’acceptation par les acteurs impliqués des résultats finaux dépendront la poursuite de la consolidation du processus de paix, la stabilisation du pays et le retour effectif à un contexte plus favorable au respect des droits humains. Des groupes armés font obstructions à l'enrôlement des électeurs Or sur le terrain, les opérations d’enrôlement des électeurs n’ont pu avoir lieu dans certaines régions du pays, notamment dans le nord-ouest, en  raison de l’insécurité due aux activités des groupes armées. Certains d’entre eux font délibérément obstruction aux opérations d’enrôlement pour démontrer leur capacité de nuisance. Pour l’expert indépendant, l’Agence nationale des élections (ANE) devrait prendre toutes les dispositions nécessaires, avec l’appui des partenaires régionaux et internationaux, pour résorber le retard dans la finalisation du processus d’enrôlement des électeurs et la publication de la liste électorale définitive. Elle doit également veiller au caractère transparent du processus d’enrôlement des électeurs. De telles mesures permettraient de « dissiper, dès à présent, tout soupçon de fraudes et de dysfonctionnements supposés ou réels, et s’assurer que les opérations couvrent l’ensemble du territoire national », a dit M. Agbetse. Le premier tour de l’élection présidentielle en RCA est fixé au 27 décembre 2020. Le Président centrafricain actuel, Faustin Archange Touadéra, a annoncé sa candidature tout comme deux anciens chefs d’Etat, François Bozizé chassé du pouvoir en 2013 après 10 ans de règne et Catherine Samba-Panza qui dirigea le pays à titre intérimaire de 2014 à 2016, ainsi que trois anciens Premiers Ministres, Mahamat Kamoun, Anicet-Georges Dologuélé et Martin Ziguélé. « L’examen des candidatures n’est pas encore intervenu », a indiqué M. Agbetse. D’une manière générale, l’expert indépendant onusien est préoccupé par le fait que le dialogue politique peine à se matérialiser, alors que la situation est marquée par des tensions sociopolitiques, y compris dans les médias et les réseaux sociaux. Selon lui, le contexte électoral rend impérieuse la reprise effective d’un dialogue inclusif pour redonner confiance aux différents acteurs dans une marche apaisée vers les élections libres, inclusives et transparentes. En un an, plus de 190 cas de meurtres liés au conflit Par ailleurs, l’expert indépendant onusien indique avoir été informé « de divers épisodes de violences qui ont mis en évidence une augmentation des incidents relatifs aux droits de l’homme touchant les civils ». De juillet 2019 à juin 2020, 880 incidents d’abus ont été documentés par la Division des droits de l’homme de la Mission des Nations Unies en Centrafrique (MINUSCA). Ces violations des droits humains ont concerné plus de 1.500 victimes. Pendant la même période, la Division a documenté plus de 190 cas de meurtres liés au conflit. Les différents abus documentés au cours de la période examinée sont des meurtres, des menaces de mort, des violences sexuelles liées aux conflits – notamment des viols –, des traitements cruels, inhumains et dégradants. L’expert fait état également de privations arbitraires de liberté, des confiscations de biens, des destructions et des pillages de biens, des enlèvements, des attaques contre le personnel humanitaire, les hôpitaux et les Casques bleus et des recrutements d’enfants dans les groupes armés. Les préfectures les plus touchées par les violations des droits de l’homme au cours de cette période ont été celles de l’Ouaka, de Haute-Kotto, de Bamingui-Bangoran, de l’Ouham-Pendé et de l’Ouham. Les groupes armés signataires de l’accord de paix sont présumés responsables de 715 incidents ayant fait plus de 1.300 victimes, soit plus de 80% du nombre total d’incidents et 85% du nombre total de victimes. Quant aux agents de l’État, notamment les Forces armées centrafricaines (FACA), la police et la gendarmerie, ils sont présumés responsables de plus de 80 cas de violations des droits de l’homme impliquant plus de 100 victimes, soit 9% du nombre total de violations documentées et 6% du nombre total de victimes. Nombreux cas de violences sexuelles liées au conflit Les parties au conflit en RCA, les groupes armés en particulier, se seraient rendues coupables de nombreux cas de violences sexuelles. Il s’agit essentiellement de viols, de tentatives de viol, d’esclavage sexuel et de mariages forcés. « Les victimes sont souvent réticentes à porter plainte, par peur de représailles et de la stigmatisation », a fait valoir l’expert. Entre novembre 2019 et juin 2020, la MINUSCA a enregistré 25 incidents de viols perpétrés par des membres du groupe armé 3R (Retour, Réclamation, Réhabilitation), touchant 37 victimes. « Le leader du 3R, Souleymane Bi Sidi, alias « Général » Sidiki Abass, a été nommé par le gouvernement, dans le cadre du processus de paix, conseiller spécial chargé des Unités spéciales mixtes de sécurité (USMS) pour la zone centre-nord, malgré le fait que des violations des droits de l’homme soient enregistrées dans tout l’ouest et le nord-ouest de l’Ouham-Pende, où les 3R ont leurs bases et contrôlent les routes de transhumance et les mines d’or environnantes », a regretté l’expert. Bangui sollicite l'aide de la communauté internationale pour lutter contre les groupes armés Outre la lutte contre l’impunité en RCA, l’expert indépendant onusien a plaidé pour un cessez-le-feu immédiat afin de permettre un processus électoral apaisé et inclusif. Face au sombre tableau décrit par M. Agbetse, le gouvernement centrafricain a reconnu que « malheureusement les groupes armés continuaient à mener des actions terribles telles que des crimes et des enlèvements ». « Malgré la bonne volonté du gouvernement, certains groupes armés se rendent dans les zones libérées pour provoquer le gouvernement », a déclaré Léopold Ismaël Samba, Représentant permanent de la RCA auprès des Nations Unies à Genève. Pour l’ambassadeur centrafricain, son gouvernement a besoin d’aide pour empêcher les groupes armés de nuire à la population. « Toutes les mesures possibles doivent être prises pour mettre fin à la violence qui pourrait compromettre les prochaines élections », a-t-il fait remarquer. Bangui estime que la communauté internationale doit l’aider à lutter efficacement contre l’impunité. « Chaque année, le gouvernement est amené à croire que ses plaintes seront prises en compte. Au-delà des rituels et des discours habituels, un nouveau paradigme est nécessaire. La République centrafricaine a trop souffert », a conclu M. Samba. © 2020 United Nations.

Alors que le climat politique se tend, en Côte d’Ivoire, pouvoir et opposition doivent retrouver le moyen de dialoguer, au risque que des violences n’éclatent. C’est la crainte d’Arsène Brice Bado, du Centre de recherche et d’action pour la Paix (CERAP), qui préconise un report du scrutin. Publié par Jeune Afrique le 21 septembre 2020. Des policiers détiennent un manifestant pendant une manifestation le 13 août contre la décision d'Alassane Ouattara [Luc Gnago / Reuters] À 40 jours de l’élection présidentielle du 31 octobre prochain, la situation politique semble s’orienter chaque jour un peu plus dans une impasse. Dimanche, les principales plateformes de l’opposition réunies au sein d’un front commun ont même appelé à la « désobéissance civile » et lancent des appels à manifester contre la candidature d’Alassane Ouattara à un troisième mandat. Or, les manifestations sont interdites dans le pays, faisant craindre l’irruption de violences. Le chercheur Arsène Brice Bado, directeur adjoint du Centre de recherche et d’action pour la Paix (CERAP), basé à Abidjan, est notamment l’auteur d’un récent rapport sur les efforts de pacification des élections. Pour Jeune Afrique, il livre son analyse de la montée des tensions actuelles, s’inquiète de la radicalisation des positions et plaide pour un report de la date du scrutin, afin de permettre au pouvoir et à l’opposition de renouer le dialogue. Jeune Afrique : Craignez-vous que la tension politique actuelle ne débouche sur une flambée de violences ? Arsène Brice Bado : C’est une situation assez compliquée. Nous sommes sortis de la logique du dialogue et nous sommes entrés dans une logique de confrontation dont il faut sortir. Une réaction trop brutale des pouvoirs publics ou des forces de l’ordre et de sécurité contre les manifestants entrainera une escalade de la violence, c’est prévisible. Nous avons déjà vu cela le mois dernier, avec des manifestations contre la candidature de Ouattara à un troisième mandat qui ont fait plusieurs morts. Il faut vraiment gérer ces rassemblements avec beaucoup de tact, au risque que la  violence ne s’ajoute à la violence. L’opposition a posé plusieurs préalables à sa participation au scrutin du 31 octobre, comme la dissolution du Conseil constitutionnel et de la Commission électorale indépendante (CEI), l’audit de la liste électorale ou encore le retour des exilés. Ces demandes vous paraissent-elles réalistes ? Cela semble difficile, à moins que les différents acteurs politiques trouvent en quelques semaines des compromis viables sur des points importants, tels que la dissolution de la CEI. À mon sens, il faudrait repousser la date des élections. Bien sûr, cela entrainera des questions juridiques complexes, mais ce serait un moindre mal pour préserver la paix et prendre le temps de rétablir le dialogue entre l’opposition et le pouvoir. En réalité, pour le moment, les conditions pour une élection pacifique ne sont pas vraiment réunies. Nous sommes face à deux camps qui sont en train de se positionner pour s’affronter. Il faut vraiment renouer le dialogue. Ce front commun de l’opposition peut-il tenir au-delà de l’élection ? La politique en Côte d’Ivoire est tellement complexe et mouvante, c’est difficile à dire. Les alliances se font et se défont rapidement. Ce sont des alliances circonstancielles. Pour durer, il faut forger une vision commune sur un certain nombre de choses. Le problème est que la politique ivoirienne s’articule autour de personnes et non autour d’enjeux de société. Résultat, les conflits entre les personnes se transforment en conflits nationaux. Deux individus peuvent ne pas s’entendre, ce n’est pas pour cela que tout un pays doit en souffrir. La faiblesse est là, nous sommes rivés sur les individus. Plusieurs partis d’opposition, dont Génération peuple solidaire (GPS) de Guillaume Soro et la frange du Front populaire ivoirien restée fidèle à Laurent Gbagbo, dont les leaders sont actuellement hors du pays, ont-ils les moyens de mobiliser la rue ? Je pense que tous ont les moyens de mobiliser. Maintenant est-ce que les mobilisations seront structurées, bien planifiées, c’est autre chose. Il peut y avoir plein de gens dans la rue sans que cela n’ait un impact réel. Il faut surtout bien insister sur un point, les mobilisations de rue, actuellement, en cette période, sont dangereuses. La polarisation est tellement grande que cela peut dégénérer très rapidement en affrontements. Les partis d’opposition n’appellent pas, pour le moment, au boycott de l’élection présidentielle. Quelle serait la conséquence d’un tel appel ? La politique de la chaise vide n’a jamais vraiment payé. Ce serait un échec du débat. Il faut plutôt réussir à reconstruire des ponts, ouvrir le débat démocratique et aplanir les points qui constituent des pierres d’achoppement entre les différents acteurs de l’élection. Faut-il craindre une nouvelle crise post-électorale ? La crainte n’est pas à écarter.  Quand on observe la situation politique actuelle, il y a de quoi être inquiet, tout simplement parce que le processus électoral ne fait pas l’objet d’un consensus. Si je dois donner une image, le pays est comme un bus qui zigzague et tangue sur une piste difficile. Il peut tomber, comme il peut ne pas tomber. J’ai l’impression que, sur le plan sécuritaire, la Côte d’Ivoire est cependant mieux préparée qu’en 2010. Mais la sécurité ne suffit pas si des milliers ou des millions de personnes descendent dans la rue. Il faut plutôt compter et travailler à ce que les uns et les autres trouvent un compromis et abordent les élections dans un esprit démocratique. Les différents acteurs politiques devraient se percevoir comme des rivaux et non comme des ennemis. Nous ne sommes pas en guerre. Perdre une élection n’est pas la fin du monde, la gagner n’est pas une panacée. © Jeune Afrique 2020, tous droits réservés.

Chechnya Is Trying to Exterminate Gay People. Our Silence Only Emboldens Vladimir Putin and Ramzan Kadyrov. A new film, “Welcome to Chechnya,” documents the torture, disappearances, and extrajudicial killings of gay men in the Russian republic. By Mehdi Hasan for The Intercept. “Grisha,” left, reuniting with his boyfriend, “Bogdan,” in the documentary “Welcome to Chechnya.” (HBO/L.A. Times) Torture. Rape. Murder. I cannot get the gruesome images of these brutal crimes out of my head. “Welcome to Chechnya: Inside the Russian Republic’s Deadly War on Gays,” which premiered at the Sundance Festival in January and airs on HBO next week, is one of the most harrowing films I have ever seen. “Imagine in the 21st century, in a supposedly secular country,” says David Isteev, at the start of this acclaimed documentary, “you have cases where people are killed simply because they are homosexual — where they are maimed, where the families of these people are urged to kill their children and siblings. It’s unreal.” “Welcome to Chechnya” follows Isteev, emergency program coordinator for the Russian LGBT Network, and his fellow activists as they risk their lives trying to protect gay Chechens from being targeted both by the authorities and their own families. Chechnya is a small Muslim-majority republic in southwestern Russia. It is also a place where gay people live in terror. Since 2017, there have been a series of state-sponsored anti-gay purges across Chechnya, in which hundreds of gay men have been arrested and detained in secret prisons. The purges were first revealed by the independent Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta in April 2017 and later corroborated by Human Rights Watch, among others. “We documented a large-scale, vicious, anti-gay purge” marked by  “torture, enforced disappearances, and extrajudicial killings,” Tanya Lokshina, the Russia program director at Human Rights Watch, told me in a phone interview from Moscow. In 2017, a detainee told Human Rights Watch, “They electrocuted us, beat us with pipes, kicked us, and punched us, they made other inmates beat us, they called us names, spat in our faces.” In December 2018, there were reports of a second wave of arrests and attacks against gay Chechens. Yet there has been little coverage of their plight over the past 18 months. For David France, the award-winning director of “Welcome to Chechnya,” it makes no sense to talk of a “first” or a “second” purge, as it is all part of a single ongoing campaign of persecution against gay Chechens. “They are still being hunted,” France told me in a phone interview from New York. The hunter-in-chief is Ramzan Kadyrov, a thuggish, tiger-loving autocrat who was installed as president of Chechnya by Russian President Vladmir Putin in 2007. Kadyrov, Lokshina said, “has been enabled by the Kremlin to run Chechnya as his own fiefdom, effectively as a state within a state, where international human rights law, and even Russian legislation, is not taken into account.” Like every good tyrant, Kadyrov has a list of “undesirables” who are demonized and scapegoated for all of the country’s problems — and top of his list are gay people. It is the Chechen leader who ordered the rounding up and detention of gay men, who he calls “subhuman” and “devils.” In recent years, he has also been “justifying and encouraging” so-called honor killings of gay Chechens by their families while his administration, France explained to me, refuses to prosecute such crimes. In an interview in July 2017, HBO sports reporter David Scott asked Kadyrov about the anti-gay pogroms in his country. “We don’t have those kinds of people here,” Kadyrov responded. “We don’t have any gays. If there are any, take them to Canada.” “Praise be to god,” the Chechen president added. “Take them far from us, so we don’t have them at home. To purify our blood, if there are any here, take them.” Kadyrov has been welcomed with open arms across the Middle East. The Chechen strongman likes to portray himself as a devout Muslim and has clamped down on alcohol while enforcing Islamic dress codes and endorsing polygamy. He sees his war on gay people as part of his “Islamization” project. France described him to me as a “madman and a despot” who “bends Islam to his own use.” To be clear: There is nothing in Islam that justifies or excuses the torture or persecution of any group of human beings. Yet the fact of the matter is that homophobia, as I have written previously, is rife in many Muslim communities across the world. Chechnya, though, is in a gay-hating league of its own. As Human Rights Watch has noted, the Russian republic “is a highly conservative, traditional Muslim society; homophobia is intense and rampant, and homosexuality is generally viewed as a stain on family honor.” Last March, more than 30 countries signed a joint statement at the U.N. Human Rights Council calling for “a swift, thorough and impartial investigation into the alleged persecution” of gay people in Chechnya. With the exception of Albania, not a single Muslim-majority country signed onto the statement. Meanwhile, Muslim communities across the West fundraise and lobby for persecuted Palestinians, Kashmiris, Rohingya, Uighurs … but not Chechens being “hunted” by Kadyrov and his goons. Those Chechens, it seems, are the wrong kind of Muslims — they are gay Muslims. The vicious pogroms against gay men in Chechnya, however, cannot only be laid at the door of Islam or Muslims. Russia itself is plagued by homophobia — encouraged both by the Russian Orthodox Church and the country’s president. “It’s obvious where Putin stands,” a frustrated Russian LGTBQ activist says in “Welcome to Chechnya.” “If they told him that gays were being killed, he wouldn’t give a damn.” In 2013, Putin signed the now-notorious “gay propaganda” law, which criminalized the distribution of “propaganda of non-traditional sexual relationships.” Polls suggest a majority of Russians believe gays are conspiring to “destroy” the country’s values, while 1 in 5 of them want to “eliminate” gay and lesbian people from Russian society. Then there is the global context: As the director, France, reminded me, homosexuality remains illegal in more than 70 countries across the world and is punishable by death in eight of them. Is it any wonder, then, that activists talk of a “gay genocide”? In May 2017, in fact, three French gay rights groups filed a complaint at the International Criminal Court accusing Chechnya of a policy of genocide against gay people. The legal problem, though, as France points out, is that the Genocide Convention applies only to “national, ethnical, racial, or religious” groups, thereby excluding persecuted LGBTQ communities. Nevertheless, France draws a direct comparison with the Holocaust. “This is the first time since Hitler’s regime that there has been an open, government-directed policy to round up and liquidate LGBTQ people,” he told me. Between 1933 and 1945, according to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, “an estimated 100,000 men were arrested for violating Nazi Germany’s law against homosexuality, and of these, approximately 50,000 were sentenced to prison. An estimated 5,000 to 15,000 men were sent to concentration camps on similar charges, where an unknown number of them perished.” “Never again” has (rightly) become the global mantra, in reference to the Holocaust. But, with regard to gay people, it is happening again. Right now. In Chechnya. So where, today, is the outrage from our politicians or the press? Where are the protests? Why the lack of global support for this repressed minority? As Lokshina pointed out to me, most Western countries have failed to provide a “safe haven” for gay Chechens fleeing persecution. The United States under Donald Trump may have imposed financial sanctions on Chechen leaders, for example, but it hasn’t admitted a single LGBTQ refugee from Chechnya. Remember, our inaction, our indifference and, above all else, our silence makes us complicit in these crimes against LGBTQ communities. But it’s much worse than that. Our silence also emboldens brutal demagogues like Putin and Kadyrov — and lays the groundwork for further human rights abuses across the board. “If there’s no punishment,” says an exhausted-looking Isteev toward the end of the film, “if LGBT people are regarded as subhuman, if you can do anything to them, it means that tomorrow, anyone can find themselves in the shoes of gay Chechens.” “Welcome to Chechnya“ airs on HBO on June 30. This article was published by The Intercept on June 28, 2020. © FIRST LOOK MEDIA. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

US Barriers to Asylum Block Path to Safety (Washington, DC) – The governments of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras have failed to effectively address violence and entrenched discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, leading many to seek asylum in the United States, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Yet policies by the administration of US President Donald Trump have made it almost impossible for them to obtain asylum. The 138-page report, “‘Every Day I Live in Fear’: Violence and Discrimination against LGBT People in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, and Obstacles to Asylum in the United States,” documents violence experienced by LGBT people in the three Northern Central American countries collectively known as the Northern Triangle, including at the hands of gangs, law enforcement officials, and their own families. Human Rights Watch found that Northern Triangle governments fail to adequately protect LGBT people against violence and discrimination, and that they face major obstacles if they attempt to seek asylum in the United States. “Every Day I Live in Fear” Violence and Discrimination Against LGBT People in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, and Obstacles to Asylum in the United States Download the full report in English “LGBT people in the Northern Triangle face high levels of violence that their own governments appear unable or unwilling to address,” said Neela Ghoshal, senior LGBT rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “For some LGBT people in the region, seeking asylum in the United States is the only hope of safety, but the Trump administration has blocked them at every turn.” Human Rights Watch interviewed 116 LGBT people from the three countries. Some described violence by family members, leading them to flee home as young as at age 8. Others described bullying and discrimination that drove them out of school. Many said family rejection and discrimination led to economic marginalization, particularly for trans women, and poverty was likely to increase the risk of violence. LGBT people from Central America, many fleeing persecution in their countries of origin, traveled through Mexico in November 2018 on their way to seek asylum in the United States.© 2018 Spencer Platt/Getty Images LGBT people sometimes face violence and discrimination from the very law enforcement agents charged with keeping them safe. Carlos G., a gay refugee who traveled to the United States from Honduras in 2018, said that gang members there shot him, telling him: “Today you’re going to die, faggot.” He was afraid to report the incident to the police, who had previously harassed him for being gay and demanded sexual favors. Carlitos B., a non-binary person from Guatemala, fled after their brother assaulted and threatened to rape them. When Carlitos reported to the police, they laughed at Carlitos’s gender expression. Pricila P., a trans woman from El Salvador, said police forced her off a bus and beat her. “One of the police officers grabbed my testicles and squeezed,” she said. “He said, ‘You’re realizing you’re a man because you feel pain.’ He said that I would become a man by force.” She fled to the United States in 2019, after gang members assaulted her, abducted her gay friend, and warned her that she would be next. Both Honduras and El Salvador have passed hate crimes legislation in the last 10 years, but neither country has convicted anyone on hate crimes charges. In a landmark ruling in July 2020, a court in El Salvador convicted three police officers of murdering Camila Díaz, a trans woman who had been deported in 2018 after attempting to seek protection in the United States, but a judge dismissed hate crimes charges against them. None of the three countries has comprehensive civil law protections against discrimination, Human Rights Watch said. While Honduras outlaws employment discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity, activists said they know of no cases in which the law had been enforced. In Guatemala, a pending Life and Family Protection Bill could be used to justify discriminatory denial of services on “freedom of conscience” grounds. Given the persecution that many LGBT people face in the Northern Triangle, the US government should rigorously protect their ability to safely enter the United States and apply for asylum. Instead, the US government has increasingly closed doors to them with a series of policies that restrict access to asylum and that narrowly interpret the refugee definition in ways that exclude LGBT people from protections they previously enjoyed. In March 2020, the US government entirely closed its land borders to asylum seekers based on the pretext of Covid-19, leaving them to suffer persecution in their home countries or be stranded in Mexico. In June, the US Departments of Justice and Homeland Security proposed a major regulatory change to the US asylum system that would severely restrict LGBT people’s ability to be granted asylum by barring asylum on the basis of “gender.” In September, the Justice Department issued yet another regulation that puts asylum even further beyond their reach, tightening time limits on asylum applications and allowing immigration judges to introduce their own evidence into asylum cases, even if such evidence reflects biases such as anti-LGBT prejudice. These policies followed other severe measures the Trump administration has taken to prevent asylum seekers from ever reaching the United States and to limit their access to asylum if they do, including family separation; prolonged detention; the “Remain in Mexico” program; an expedited asylum review process allowing for little or no contact with lawyers; an attempt to bar asylum seekers who transited through third countries before arriving at the US border; and a policy of transferring Salvadoran and Honduran asylum seekers to Guatemala, where they lack effective protection. Among the asylum seekers affected by all these measures are LGBT people, who may be particularly at risk of violence and discrimination in northern Mexico. “The governments of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras need to stem rampant anti-LGBT violence and ensure that laws and policies protect LGBT people from persecution, including by police,” Ghoshal said. “As long as LGBT people continue to experience threats to their lives and safety based on their identity in their countries of origin, the US should welcome them with open arms, rather than slamming the door on them.” © 2020 Human Rights Watch

International Institute of Social Studies of Erasmus University (ISS) ISS Working Paper Series / General Series , Volume 649 Last updated by R.D. Ntanyoma November 2019. CITE AS: Ntanyoma, R.D. (2019). Genocide Warning: The Vulnerability of Banyamulenge ‘Invaders’ (No. 649). ISS Working Paper Series / General Series (Vol. 649). International Institute of Social Studies of Erasmus University (ISS). Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/1765/121302 A MONUSCO delegation in Fizi, one of the territories affected by recent violences, March 16 2019 (MONUSCO/Jacob de Lange) Abstract In the Eastern Congo, a little-noticed genocidal threat has been emerging in South Kivu which is in part the legacy of colonial and post-colonial patterns of excluding those known as the Banyamulenge from those defined as ‘autochthonous’ in the region. Instead, defined as ‘immigrants’, the vulnerability of the Banyamulenge is easily denied. In the past, the Banyamulenge’s involuntary involvement in armed insurgencies alongside Rwandan troops worsened their reputation, as well as radicalizing their Maimai (Mayi-Mayi) opponents. These armed groups have now vowed to wipe out the Banyamulenge community. The most recent confrontations have involved foreign armed groups from neighboring countries, including Burundians opposition groups. This genocide alert is based on the evidence of a serious intent to destroy villages and kill cattle so Banyamulenge can no longer occupy their few remaining localities and sustain themselves at all in their homeland areas of Minembwe and Bijombo. Local Maimai, armed groups, combine the surrounding Babembe, Banyindu and Bafuliro communities, and are supported militarily and financially by Burundians opposition. Regular and systematic attacks on the Banyamulenge are justified by calling these Congolese citizens ‘invaders’ and accusing them of being outsiders. Between October 2018 and May 2019, narratives emerged in media and on social media seem to presage a rapid movement towards the real risk of genocide. 1. Introduction There is an almost unnoticed humanitarian crisis unfolding in Eastern DRC and especially in South Kivu, which is particularly affecting the Banyamulenge population. Given their past experiences, being victims of targeted attacks that has speeded up in recent months, there is an overlooked risk of genocide. During the successive wars in the country, I will show how Banyamulenge have been victims, and not only perpetrators, of violence. What makes their position more dangerous and vulnerable today is that their status as full Congolese citizens has been contested for decades, and their identity continues to be conflated with that of Tutsi in neighbouring Rwanda. Given the resentment that has simmered between local Maimai rebel groups and Banyamulenge communities, rejection of President Kabila also grounded on contesting his conciliatory policies towards the Banyamulenge communities (Alida 2017, Stearns et al, 2013). Instead, the Banyamulenge are still consistently portrayed in the media, and especially in social media, as ‘invaders’ in the region, long after they broke free of their former alliance with the Rwandan army, the RPA. In the wider DRC diaspora, most social media have painted the Banyamulenge Congolese as the source of all evil in the East of the country, and have equated them with former President Joseph Kabila, now removed from power, and formerly associated with this small and now beleaguered community. For decades, the Eastern Congo has been going through recurrent violent conflicts that have reinforced a toxic colonial legacy of ‘race’ that polarized ‘autochthonous’ Congolese and set them against supposedly ‘invader’ groups, notably the Banyamulenge people. In the specific context of North and South Kivu, ‘invaders’ are defined as those who use “military and cunning, aliens..” and serve as the “Trojan Horse” of neighbouring countries, aiding the hegemonic expansionism, notably of Rwanda (Hoffman, 2007:94, Jackson, 2007:494, Nzongola-Ntalaja 2002). Whenever tensions rise in the Kivus, media and leaders resort to these narratives of ‘invaders’, who are in a numerical minority and highly vulnerable to being targeted. The Banyamulenge have repeatedly been targeted as outsiders, first in 1996, then in 1998, and again in 2004. However most alarmingly, recent attacks on this community within the past year seem to now have the aim of ‘finishing off the job’. Public officials have in the past been openly calling for the extermination of the Banyamulenge as ‘vermin’ [1]. This article seeks to alert the international community to this clear and present danger of genocide. The current political climate in the region of South Kivu covering Minembwe, Bijombo and the Highlands of Uvira-Fizi territories, is particularly worrying [2]. This warning builds on the classification of Genocide Watch, in which ten steps are identified as signaling an unfolding genocide or mass killing [3]. Several of these stages have been attempted and currently the stage of active persecution has been reached but has been hidden by blaming the victims collectively as ‘invaders’. The tragic truth of genocide is being hidden in accusatory language. What is happening at this stage involves systematic denial of the vulnerability of the Banyamulenge, who are consistently portrayed (as were the Jews in Europe between the wars) as being the source of evil, of conflict and of suffering. In this vein, since at least 1998, political campaigns have been painting the Banyamulenge as the principal perpetrators of massacres during rebel insurgencies across Eastern Congo, and even in the neighbouring Central African Republic (Ndahinda, 2013). Within Congolese society, these narratives have undermined any sense of humanity in relation to the ‘Banyamulenge question’ on the part of most commentators and political actors. This bias against vulnerability, regarding a people who are now facing their own extinction, once and for all, may be the filter that explains a startling failure to report on the crisis, whether in the Great Lakes region of Africa, or internationally and among NGOs and the UN. International actors working in the region thus appear to share the same view, that Banyamulenge people – civilians included – cannot be victims, since they are viewed, by definition, as perpetrators. 2. ‘Race’ as the Legacy of Colonial Rule Banyamulenge are contested-small community living in South-Kivu province; mainly, in Uvira, Fizi, Mwenga territories (Vlassenroot 2002). Some members of the Banyamulenge community have moved to Katanga Province from 1967- 69. Following intense targeted attacks over their villages, Banyamulenge in Katanga (Vyura and Moba) were forced to leave this region in 1998. Being a contested community and living in a state with feeble schemes of updating data collection (the last census was done in 1984), Banyamulenge’s exact number is unknown and contested. Their eponym (toponym) is too contested as their estimation (Kakozi-Katembo 2005, Kibiswa 2015, Muhindo-Kambere 1996). However, some estimation ranges their figure between 50,000 and 400,000 as per different source (Mutambo-Jondwe 1997, Reyntjens & Marysse 1996, Stearns 2013). There have been debates have been going on over their exact figure. Consequent to cycle of wars, some have fled to different regions (the great lakes region) or settled as refugees outside of Africa. Like other migrations in the Eastern Congo region, their exact period of settlement in what became Congo is not subjected to debate. However, most accounts of historians agree that they settled well before the arrival of colonizers. However, colonial archives have portrayed them as ‘Ruandas or Banyaruandas’ who settled in the South-Kivu region between XVIIIe and XIXe century (Hiernaux 1965, Reyntjens and Marysse 1996, Weis 1959). Being cattle herders, they have later adopted sedentarism lifestyle for seeking grazing pastures. Therefore, they formed later agglomerations in which colonial administration could organize them into political organizations. However, Banyamulenge are said to have been discriminated and victims of of their stance against the colonial rule (Weis 1959). As indicates Vlassenroot (2002), (Stearns 2013) among others, the colonial administration could have favored large ethnic communities in merging customary chieftaincies and Banyamulenge were left without their own customary chieftaincies. The decisions could have been motivated by how they felt ‘nilotes’ as ‘new-comers’. The colonial legacy polarized the ‘Bantu’ and ‘Nilotic’ peoples of the entire Great Lakes region of the continent, bringing in the poisonous ideology of racial differences. This led to the reproduction of so-called ‘autochthonous’ and ‘invader’ groups of people. Those defined as ‘Bantu’ ethnic groups were viewed as ‘natives’ while the ‘Nilotic―Hamitic’ people, sharply distinguished from Bantu by European ideas about race, were considered to have come from Ethiopia or Egypt and to be outsiders (Hintjens 2001: 29). Race theories have not been abandoned in the African Great Lakes region. Whereas in Europe it has become politically unacceptable to refer to someone as ‘Aryan’ or ‘Semitic’, in the African Great Lakes region, the toxic power of ‘race’ labels continues to operate at the daily level of discourse and actions. The Banyamulenge are thus assimilated with the Tutsi, who according to the Hamitic hypothesis of ‘race theory’, are Nilotes or even Semites (Hiernaux 1965, Sanders 1969). To reflect on how this situation of being classified as ‘outsiders’ arose, Jackson (2006:107) reflects that during the colonial era: "Nilotes"—supposedly the Tutsi in Rwanda, Burundi, and Congo, the Hima in Uganda, and variously one or two other ethnic groups—were depicted as historical invaders and dispossessors all the way from the Horn of Africa: allochthons par excellence for the entire region” [4]. Jackson stresses that this myth of Nilotic people as ‘invaders’ still operates today, and has led many local militias, including the Maimai militias in Eastern DRC [5], to consider Banyamulenge as Tutsi invaders who should leave and vacate ‘their own lands’ for the benefit of the indigenous or ‘autochthonous’ Bantu people of the region. The Maimai (or Mayi-Mayi) combatants are motivated by the sense of repelling these supposed invaders from the land. A form of depression has also been noted in the Maimai combatants, which is expressed in their ultimate dream of expelling all ‘Tutsis’ from their land and from their country. According to this dream, the end result would be so valuable – namely the restoration of their lands – that it becomes honorable to kill as many Banyamulenge as one can. In this vein, Bøas and Dunn (2014:154) have underscored that This is the melancholy of the Mayi-Mayi: the sense of being deprived of something, something that has been lost by the Congolese people. Why are the Congolese so poor, yet Congo so abundant in natural resources, they ask. And in this question lies a nostalgia for a past lost; a past that can only be brought back if certainty about people and places can be re-established… In this narrative the culprits are the Tutsi, who are portrayed as ‘alien’ exploiters of Congo and the Congolese. [6] These colonial racial characterizations of entire communities that have lived in DRC for centuries, have been fuelling recent violence, including the targeted massacring of Banyamulenge civilians (Mathys 2017, Ngonga, 2003). Researchers have documented the widely shared ideology among armed Maimai groups in the Kivus, of protecting their lands against all ‘invaders’, whether from outside or their ‘home-grown’ allies within the country (MwakaBwenge 2003:79, Stearns et al, 2013:28). This everlasting battle as Hoffman points out in his study (Hoffman 2007) involves an on-going war between ‘Bantu’ and ‘Tutsi’ from the Maimai perspective. Following the 1998, foreign armies, including the Rwandan Patriotic Army, intervened and fought in Congo on what is known as the African World War (Prunier 2009, Turner 2007). Hoffman undertook his field researcher while many of these armies had withdrawn including the Rwandan one. Even though the Rwandan army had withdrawn from Congo, Hoffman (2007:84) trying to respond to why Maimai are considering to be in a state of war; he come up with an idea that the latter groups felt that Rwandans “are still represented in the country, not only in the form of the Banyamulenge and the Banyarwanda communities, but equally in the institutions of power they are thought to have infiltrated: “the Maï-Maï are in a defensive position.”” For some years now, the ideological battle around identity has moved from the phase of initial symbolization (in the language of Greg Stanton) to mobilization for ethnic cleansing and hate speech (Hintjens 2006). As for the Tutsi of Rwanda and Burundi, Hintjens (2006) suggested that those known as ‘Banyarwanda’ in Eastern DRC are widely referred to as ‘snakes’, with the logical outcome that the recommended action is to chase them “out of farmland areas with pangas, or knives”, notes Hintjens (2006: 607). These narratives reflecting on colonial accounts have strikingly been disseminated outside of the Congo as notes (Ndahinda 2013:493) in the Bemba Banyamulenge case before the International Criminal Court (ICC). Individuals (less than 10) with limited role with the Bemba’s rebellion are amalgamated to an entire ethnic community. In South Kivu Province in particular, where most remaining Banyamulenge live, they are yet of relevance (Verweijen and Brabant 2017:16) [7]. The discourses around ‘invaders’ who have collaborated with Rwandan armed forces in the past, and thus are viewed as having been a bridge to hegemonic ambitions of the neighboring country, remain the dominant ‘trope’ in local media when referring to the Banyamulenge. The formation of armed groups in Eastern DRC continues to be along strictly ethnic and ‘race’ lines, and this fact alone is highly significant for the risks of genocide against a now-isolated group like the Banyamulenge. Conflict and warfare in DRC have become ‘racialized’ as well as ‘ethnicised’, and mobilization is as much along lines of ‘Bantu’ versus ‘Nilotic’ or ‘Hamitic’, as along ethnic lines, per se. The distinctions of ‘race’ introduced by the Belgians in the late nineteenth century, pristine European ‘race science’, remains today the dominant lens through which armed groups interpret vulnerability and armed aggression. Illustratively, Christophe Kwebe Kimpele, a well-known Congolese journalist (between 1974-94) and presently exiled in Europe, declared that there would not be presidential elections in 2017-18 because the country is under occupation of 545 Tutsi military officers. In his statement, one can read that he would prefer an ‘occupation’ of Hutu than Tutsi. Moreover, Kwebe stresses on the Kivu’s occupation by invaders to be chased by guns not elections [8]. These racial strategies of singling Tutsi or Banyamulenge that have been used in many circumstances to mobilize combatants. This is why Maimai groups commonly affiliate to the Babembe, Bafuliro and Banyindu communities, which are seen as ‘Bantu’, and therefore ethnic communities which consider themselves unquestionably ‘autochthonous’ to the Congo. Others who are ‘Nilotic’ or ‘Hamitic’, thereby come to be defined as ‘new-comers’, despite the lack of evidence for this supposition, and are therefore implicated as ‘foreigners’ and ‘invaders’. The Banyamulenge stand accused of having ‘Rwandan’ origin, and yet are equated not with the Hutu ‘Bantu’ majority, but with the Tutsi minority, showing how ‘race’ also trumps nationality as a vector of identity conflict and genocidal ideology today. 3. Banyamulenge ‘invaders’: Contested autochthony Despite having been resident in the territory that is now DRC for centuries, the Banyamulenge are viewed as perpetual ‘foreigners’ who can legitimately be resisted – and even massacred - through armed force (Bøås & Dunn 2014; Jackson 2006; Mathys 2017; Sanders 1969). As Verweijen (2015a:166) has extensively documented, ‘autochthony’ discourses play a key role in armed mobilization in Fizi territory, the region where most of the remaining DRC Banyamulenge community now lives. Verweijen makes analogies with the situation in Kosovo, comparing attacks in Minembwe on a vulnerable enclave community identified as ethnically – in this case racially – distinct from the majority, as comparable to attacks on Albanians in Kosovo. Now, as throughout history, genocide and mass atrocities in South Kivu are being justified by claims of ‘legitimate self-defence’ by those who claim to be more ‘local’ than others living in the area, perceived as ‘invaders’. In her study, Verweijen (2015a:166) suggests that, from this defensive perspective: “For the Mai-Mai [in Fizi territory], taking up arms is not a manifestation of bellicose intentions but rather a legitimate act of self-protection needed to ward off the supposed aggression of the Banyamulenge and defend the territorial integrity of both Fizi and the Congo” A cycle of racialized violence and armed mobilization over many years has resulted in a sense of collective victimization among virtually all the ethnic communities of the region and has increased popular prejudice among these communities in the process. In recent years, however, the Banyamulenge of Eastern DRC, especially in South Kivu, have started to look more and more isolated. They now find themselves in an extremely vulnerable position, a position that is becoming increasingly threatening to their survival [9]. The historical record makes it quite clear that the Banyamulenge were settled permanently in the region now called DRC, within the country’s borders, well before the 1885 Berlin Conference (Ntanyoma 2019; Prunier 2009). Historically, the myth that Banyamulenge people might pose a threat to other ‘Bantu’ Congolese people first arose during the 1960s. At that time, anti-Banyamulenge prejudices were first openly expressed during the last stages of the Simba-Mulele rebellion (Muzuri, 1983, Stearns 2013, Vlassenroot, 2002). Initially some Banyamulenge had fought in this rebellion against the authorities in Kinshasa, but once Simba-Mulele rebels started looting Banyamulenge cattle, claiming from a rather crude Marxist perspective that Banyamulenge were part of the capitalist class, the Banyamulenge found themselves victims of the Mulelists and were forced to defend themselves against their erstwhile comrades-in-arms (Stearns, 2013, Vlassenroot 2002). This episode set the tone for future political manipulation involving on-going contestation of the Congolese citizenship of Banyamulenge people. Following on from this, President Mobutu changed the nationality laws of Zaire in the 1970s and 1980s, excluding Banyamulenge from full citizenship. The National Sovereign Conference, a democratic experiment in 1992-1995, the Banyamulenge were equated with a Rwandan ‘third column’ inside Zaire. The community started to be attacked physically by Maimai ‘defense’ militias, after Banyamulenge soldiers had been more or less forcibly recruited into the invading forces led by the Rwandan army, which helped Laurent Kabila to seize power. Squeezed from all sides by fighting in the region, the Banyamulenge started to be systematically attacked by MaiMai from the late-1990s, as the toxic ideology behind the Rwanda genocide spilled into what then became the Democratic Republic of Congo. The Rwandan invasion of Zaire, and imposition of regime change, posed new problems for the Banyamulenge’s reputation as ‘invaders’. Today they find themselves almost entirely without allies, and literally hemmed in on all sides by the Maimai. And, as discussed below, neither the national army (FARDC) nor 20,000 United Nations MONUSCO troops have so far been able to provide the security needed to avoid wholesale massacres of the Banyamulenge by the armed forces surrounding them, and now closing in, day by day. From a distorted colonial legacy of ‘race’ which suggested that Nilotic or Hamitic people had something in common, after the Rwanda genocide, the Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA) considered the Banyamulenge as natural allies to the persecuted Tutsi within Rwanda. Caught in the growing hostility of other Congolese, and the insecurity of Eastern Zaire/DRC, the Banyamulenge started to cooperate militarily with the Rwandan army from around 1996. From this time on, the perception of Banyamulenge as outsiders, allied with other ‘invaders from Rwanda’ was reinforced, especially among the Maimai militias in South Kivu. Banyamulenge soldiers’ involvement in the 1996 rebellion, alongside Rwandan forces, and in the subsequent overthrow of President Mobutu, reinforced existing tensions between Maimai and Banyamulenge armed groups in South Kivu (Stearns 2013, Turner 2007). The alliance with RPA undermined already weak social cohesion among the Banyamulenge and their neighbouring ‘Bantu’ communities in South-Kivu (Reid 2014). This alliance had its problems from the start, as the RPA hardly respected these auxiliary fighters. Even so, it had the unfortunate consequence of seeming to confirm the prejudices of many Congolese that the Banyamulenge, were essentially ‘Rwandans’ living in their midst. Consequently, there evolved growing resentment and hostility from neighboring communities in South Kivu in particular. Meanwhile, neighbouring communities had become victims of the killings and massacres carried out by Rwandan and allied armed groups, and these deaths and the suffering they experienced started to be attributed to their immediate neighbors, the Banyamulenge, viewed as allies of the RPA. The Maimai were understandably unforgiving about the role of the Banyamulenge at the ‘forefront of rebellion’ for regime change, alongside the RPA. However, Banyamulenge fighters soon became tired of being involved in the proxy wars being fought by Rwanda in the Congo, and revoked their initial support for the Rwandan army, which continued to operate in Eastern DRC after 1998 in the form of a rebel alliance known as Rassemblement Congolais pour la Démocratie (RCD) (Vlassenroot 2013). To a large extent, however, the damage was done, and the label of ‘invader’ stuck. With roots in Banyamulenge resistance to Rwandan control, in 2002 an armed resistance group known as Gumino was created by Masunzu [10], a disaffected military officer (Stearns 2013, Vlassenroot 2013). Whilst commander with the Laurent Kabila’s army, Masunzu had (in)voluntarily joined the 1998 rebel’s movement, namely the Congolese Rally for Democracy (RCD) that was supported by Rwanda. His group was mainly composed by Banyamulenge soldiers who fought the RCD and RPA (now RDF) between February to September 2002 (Ntanyoma 2019:225). Since then, Masunzu’s group forms the core part of Gumino and had split several times under pressure from neighboring militias, especially the Maimai. After two successive waves of integration of these fighters into the FARDC, the Congolese national army, in 2005 and in 2011 (J. Stearns 2013:8), remnants of the group were so weakened they were unable to counter mounting threats from neighbouring Maimai groups. 4. Prelude to a Genocide: Security Vacuum to Economic Crime Of course, the national army, the FARDC, is supposed to provide security and protection for all Congolese citizens. Yet in South-Kivu we see what a failed state looks like in the non-functioning of the national army. Underpaid, FARDC forces are also poorly equipped and are quite unable to protect local populations or their property. In practice, FARDC soldiers are so weak they tend to ally themselves with other armed groups in order to be able to operate, often fighting against other FARDC soldiers in different alliances. This situation has worsened the problem of attacks on civilians, since there is no armed force to protect them. More senior FARDC officers justify their failure to protect civilians behind claims of neutrality. Yet in a region as fragmented as South Kivu, the national army has behaved more or less like other irregular armed groups and resembles the rag-tag militias it is supposed to combat, like militias. In recent clashes, FARDC officers have been quite openly partisan. They remain less well equipped than many irregular soldiers, who are often can pay themselves, and have better morale, than soldiers in the regular army. FARDC soldiers have been accused of standing indifferent while local armed groups are attacking civilians, or worse of collaborating in such attacks. The FARDC is historically distrusted by local communities in South Kivu, who are more likely to see soldiers of the national army as abusers than protectors. As one FARDC officer, interviewed by the researcher stated: We are part of the community which we came from. And that community is still highly polarized for several reasons. Whenever the army fails to meet the challenge of providing security for local population, the consequences are twofold. On the one hand, a victim will simply conclude that we did nothing to protect them because of the community they belong to. This is part of the explanation of what is happening in Beni (North-Kivu) [11]. Secondly, we are also human. Just imagine when facing a challenge of not being able to respond to a threat affecting your own parents, sisters and brothers…sometimes, we can behave madly in hoping to save something or at least save your face in front of your relatives [12]. One of the polarizations he refers to is between agriculturalists and pastoralists. The practice of transhumance results in accusations against Banyamulenge that their cattle are regularly accused to devastate the fields of nearby agriculturalists. The presence of cows during a dry season when crops are failing can provoke envy, and disputes can lead to wider clashes between farmers and cattle herders, in this case also between those thought of as ‘Bantu’ and ‘Nilotic’. It happens that cattle belonging to those not seen as ‘invaders’ are accommodated. The large-scale cattle raiding against the Banyamulenge in Fizi, Itombwe and Uvira regions, was mentioned earlier, and started long before and widened around 2016 (Verweijen and Brabant 2017). Cattle looting often followed violent disputes between farmers and herders over boundaries, water use and pasturage in the region (Stearns et al 2013). At times, cattle raiding has been preceded by a form of taxation known as Ituro, a kind of levy that targets mainly pastoral communities such as the Banyamulenge. Traditionally, local chiefs could levy Ituro, but since wars started in DRC, armed groups have been appropriating Ituro for themselves, as if they were chiefs. As tax money is collected and reallocated by armed groups, this can become another source of local tensions and attacks. Besides grievances between farmers and cattle herders, the looting of cattle results from the security vacuum that has arisen in South Kivu region. When cows are looted by local militias, FARDC may either turn a blind eye, or even be involved in profiting from the sale of stolen cattle, and the purchasing of arms and weaponry. In the past, military officers in South Kivu were accused of favoring cattle herders above farmers, since herders could ‘buy’ protection in exchange for cattle. Bad experiences by all sides with army units, has meanwhile weakened the legitimacy and status of FARDC troops, eroding trust. There are also indications that FARDC is not even able or willing to curb the intervention of foreign armed groups. The army’s lack of equipment and logistical supplies leads to low morale and explains how several foreign armies could become established on DRC soil, without any real challenge from the FARDC. This continuing presence of foreign armed groups in Eastern DRC has not been much reported on since 2015 or so. By late December 2018, there has been the only official declaration (to our best knowledge) around the presence of foreign armed groups in South-Kivu. The Congolese’s Defence Minister referred to groups causing a threat against Kagame’s regime in Rwanda while these groups threatened more Congolese local population in South-Kivu but also the regime of Nkurunziza in Burundi (Independent 2019, RFI 2019). The December 2018 declaration requested a Monusco support to curb Rwandan forces activism though it largely intended to cool down mounting over the presidential elections’ flaws. Such foreign armed groups also tend to be more motivated and better equipped than the Congolese army [13]. Foreign armed groups cross borders as a means of making money, and this may allow some FARDC officers to be paid sums that exceed their meagre salaries. Facilitating cross-border movements, including of armed combatants, can be a lucrative business and may even involve top military people on both sides of the borders. Foreign combatants who are intercepted can generally be released following the payment of a relatively small sum to those guarding them. Foreign armed groups in South Kivu destabilize an already fragile situation, in ‘democratic transition’ since the 2018 elections. This undoubtedly places the lives of Banyamulenge in particular danger. Many foreign groups have allied with the historical enemies of the Banyamulenge, the Maimai, whose ideological stance is hostile to their ‘invader’ neighbours. Since FARDC army officers are suspected of supporting one armed group against another during inter-community clashes, the deployment of some military officers in the High Plateau of Minembwe-Uvira has been heavily contested. This kind of contestation can be ethnically motivated, revealing a complex picture that includes intra- as well as inter-community conflicts and armed struggles. Military officers and Generals are often so keen to take the lead, that there is splintering around issues of leadership. Many civilians in South Kivu suspect that some senior FARDC officers and Generals conspire to allow armed groups to cross the border from neighbouring countries, allowing them to undertake military operations that gain power, prestige and money for both senior FARDC personnel and those armed groups. Within this security vacuum, local communities are confronted with signs of the radical criminalization and ‘medievalization’ of violence (Kalyvas 2006: 55) [14]. Gradually, norms of army neutrality and discipline have been overtaken by popular prejudices, reinforced by the conditions of perpetual lawlessness across the region. This situation of lawlessness reinforces a sense of collective victimization among the Banyamulenge, who feel particularly threatened today, as a group. In a ‘security void’, this sense of threat is not counter-balanced by any protective military capacity. Instead, the logic is one of revenge and the result is an intensification of violence, in turn reinforcing the sense of collective victimization (Stearns 2011). Thinking through these complexities requires dexterity, but here the task is a more urgent one; to point to the present and persistent risk of genocide against the Banyamulenge of South Kivu. 5. The Clear and Present Danger of Genocide The developments that led to the most recent threats since March 2019 against Banyamulenge, involve an internationalization of war in South Kivu once again. The clear and present threat of extermination of remaining Banyamulenge in South Kivu, is signalled by the coalition of Maimai militias from three neighbouring (surrounding) ethnic communities supported with assistance from Burundi in terms of arms and supplies. The most recent wave of attacks on the community is thus built on much wider alliances and a broader coalition than in the past. Fearing the consequences of being left unprotected, after Gumino fighters were reintegrated into the FARDC, local Banyamulenge civilians have started organizing themselves into defense group of their own, in parallel to the Maimai (Verweijen and Brabant, 2017:18). These defense groups are known as Twirwaneho, meaning something like ‘let us fend for ourselves’ [15]. Some commentators (see Verweijen and Brabant 2017) have compared the Twirwaneho to Maimai groups, although the primary mission of the Twirwaneho is to protect property, cattle and housing. Given the serious and apparently unfillable security vacuum in South Kivu region, discussed in the following section, the Banyamulenge defence groups seek to prevent attacks by neighboring armed groups. Unfortunately, arming for self-defence can serve to reproduce or even increase the level of threat to the community, rather than providing effective protection for civilians. Given the wider security vacuum in South Kivu, self-defence groups may have the perverse outcome of intensifying attacks on innocent civilians on all sides. As one group, in this case the Banyamulenge, feels threatened and fears armed attacks, they organize for self-defence, in order to curb the threat. This in turn legitimates their opponents rearming themselves, claiming this is needed to reinforce their own military capacity as a precautionary measure against the possibility of being attacked by the other side. All local communities can, with good reason, claim to have been victimized, by violence inflicted by neighbouring or proxy armed groups over the past twenty years or so. Nonetheless, each armed group views the plight of their own communities as worse than those of any other, tending to disregard the suffering, deaths and displacement of all others (Stearns 2011). In this unsettled context, even very minor incidents can lead to intercommunity violence involving heavy guns. Incidents which in the past could be peacefully resolved, now spark violent responses; a friendly football match can provoke armed confrontation. Repeated massacres and destruction of property continue to fuel memories of past hostilities, with the result that all civilian communities in the South Kivu region have suffered unjustly and have a real sense of grievance and trauma. In this way, even self-defence-based groups arming themselves can produce a vicious cycle of violent irregular warfare. However, what the Banyamulenge are now facing is something far more dangerous than two-sided warfare. They are facing the prospect of being surrounded, eliminated and disappearing altogether from the DRC. They are facing the clear and present danger of genocide. Macro-level politics has a part to play in the present risk of genocide. The December 2018 elections removed President Joseph Kabila from power. Since he was seen by most Maimai as being ‘of Rwandan descent’ himself, his conciliatory policies towards the Banyamulenge fighters and community made him – and them – suspect. The reintegration of Banyamulenge fighters into the FARDC, for instance, now backfired against his erstwhile presumed allies, who were left high and dry, without defences (Alida 2017, Jackson 2006:104). The whole problem of persecution has been amplified by the growing role of social media in recent years in DRC, where all kinds of hate speech thrives [16]. The international community and regional bodies are also neglecting the ongoing violence and its impacts, which is now decimating the Banyamulenge people remaining in South Kivu. By relying on local organizations as sources of information, international actors may be driven towards accepting narratives from wider campaigns that aim to portray Banyamulenge as the source of all evil, as abusers rather than as those facing abuse. They now stand to lose everything they have, including not only their properties but also their lives, and the very future of their community. Whilst international actors characterize the fighting as a communal conflict, the Banyamulenge around Minembwe and Mikenke face genocide [17]. Concentrated in just a few villages clustered in and around these two towns, the remaining Banyamulenge have been accused of collusion and are now confronted with three allied local militias from three different ethnic communities, all allied to foreign groups. Between March and September 2019, more than 30,000 cows were pillaged in South Kivu alone [18]. This was hardly reported on at all. The main aim of such massive theft was both to impoverish and immiserate the Banyamulenge owners, but also to sell the stolen cattle to obtain military supplies in order to continue attacks. In July 2019, Deutsch Welle reported that around 140,000 people ended up homeless in 2019 following these attacks, these numbers being added to the millions of existing IDPs in DRC (Bashi 2019). Adding this huge loss of livestock to the existing economic hardship, the Banyamulenge also suffered from the burning down of an estimated 140 villages between April 2017 and early October 2019. The resulting devastation now extends from Bijombo to Minembwe via Itombwe and Kamombo. And whereas the region of Bijombo-Minembwe is inhabited by four main ethnic groups, the burned down Banyamulenge villages represented almost three quarters of the estimates 200 destroyed in total in the region during this time. Due to security situation and lack of attention, there has been scanty information collected on the exact number of deaths. The number of people displaced can be estimated at around 300,000 from a region of 3 to 4 thousand square kilometres [19]. School and health facilities throughout the region has also been decimated. Yet the Banyamulenge community have had no choice but to remain in Minembwe and are currently concentrated in Minembwe town centre and in Mikenke. They are encircled on all sides by hostile, ideologically-driven Maimai forces and by Burundi; they cannot flee in any direction. Facing weekly military attacks, they are targeted, and their remaining properties and cattle stolen, being chased to within 3 kilometers of Minembwe rural municipality offices and the MONUSCO base in Minembwe town itself. Central Minembwe itself comprises around ten villages, which are now hosting the entire remaining Banyamulenge population that has fled destruction in the entire surrounding area, their former villages burnt to ashes. This is an extremely precarious and dangerous situation, considering the ‘invader’ ideology of Maimai armed groups, and the support these militias are now receiving from well-trained Burundian armed groups. Each day, there are reports of attacks to destroy any remaining hopes for a Banyamulenge homeland within South Kivu, or in DRC for that matter. The Maimai attacks are especially intense, as they believe this could be their last opportunity to finally get ‘rid themselves’ of these ‘invaders’. So far, the FARDC has stood by indifferently, but this may not continue indefinitely; soon even they may feel compelled to defend Banyamulenge civilians from the slaughter that may lie ahead. ‘Proxy war’ seems to have raised its ugly head in the region again, so that clashes concerning outside parties have once again lethal consequences for local people. By visiting on Banyamulenge and their neighbours a form of genocidal warfare, it is hoped that direct confrontation between the military forces of Rwanda and Burundi can be avoided. South Kivu’s situation has become a ticking time bomb for the civilian population and for the Banyamulenge in particular. Despite UN Group of Experts’ report on the establishment of foreign groups in The Uvira High Plateau (UNGoE 2019, UNGoE 2018, UNGoE 2016), it seems that there have been lack of attention to the renewed recent violence in the form of proxy warfare and violence against civilians in Eastern DRC. The failure to rightly frame this human tragedy is more or less linked to the powerful personal, political and business interests―biases of several actors including Congolese military and Monusco officials. As has strongly indicated (Autesserre 2012:8), most of these international actors operating in Congo failed due to an over-reliance on official data from UN and Congolese authorities, poor relationships between international interveners and their Congolese counterparts, lack of access to the most unstable areas, and the staff’s inability to speak local languages. As armed men keep crossing DRC borders to reinforce Maimai groups attacking the Banyamulenge, this community’s situation becomes increasingly untenable. Various sources (Africa Confidential 2019, KST 2019) have suggested that RDF has crossed the Congolese border (under yet undisclosed agreement) to fight Rwandan groups operating in Congo and opposed to Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) rule in Rwanda. There are even rumours that RPA elements may be hidden within the DRC national army in North-Kivu and have been fighting the FDLR in this way. RPA forces are also said to have penetrated Burundian rebels operating in South Kivu against the Banyamulenge, showing how former allies can sometimes become the most dangerous of enemies. Several reports confirm that Burundian and Rwandan involvement is more than simply a local rumor (Nichols 2016, UNGoE 2016, UNGoE 2018). This situation has created what is now an urgent humanitarian crisis in South-Kivu in which Banyamulenge are now arguably the most vulnerable community in the region. However, the risk facing this community remains contested―unnoticed as there have been wider politically and social medias campaigns since 1996 up to recently to make them viewed as dominant, privileged and militaristic. The latest phase of proxy war, and the resulting humanitarian crisis facing this region, started unexpectedly, following a relatively peaceful situation in South Kivu. Between March 2017 and August 2018, Bijombo groupement came under heavy gunfire, with clashes opposing local armed groups affiliated along ethnic or ‘race’ lines. The immediate trigger for these armed confrontations was an incident in which a gunman attacked a civilian and raided a solar torch battery. The victim and the assailant belonged to different communities, and so reprisals started almost immediately to target the community of the assailant, leading ultimately to many dying, over the theft of a solar battery [20]. The rapid escalation of something quite mundane, resulted in some families being shot at home, including one police officer who was a ‘Bantu’, and seen as an autochthonous native of the region. Within weeks, the armed clashes started to escalate to the widespread burning of villages and the pillaging of Banyamulenge cows, as already mentioned. As in the past, the FARDC seemed to lack the will or capacity to prevent further clashes and MONUSCO did not intervene to enforce the peace, in spite of being at hand. Another kind of warfare has taken place through social media, which has facilitated well-coordinated demonstrations in DRC cities, and around the world, from New York and Brussels to Manchester, Goma, Bukavu and Kinshasa. In all these demonstrations, there is the same call on all Congolese to support ‘clearing out’ Minembwe Rural municipality, which is represented as having been taken over by ‘foreigners’. Contestation of the Banyamulenge IDP presence in Minembwe Rural municipality rests on a claim that this represents the Rwandan annexation of the Kivus, rather than the desperate plight of an internally displaced population of Congolese. In this way, combatants are mobilized around what is claimed to be the ‘noble’ cause of protecting the land of DRC against the alleged ‘invaders’, with whom Banyamulenge Congolese are equated. This large-scale mobilization has led local combatants to realize that it may even be possible to get rid of the ‘invaders’ in their midst once and for all. Following countless attacks, Banyamulenge have left their villages, from Mibunda-Itombwe, which has been attacked at least eight times, from Kamombo neighbourhood, which has been attacked five times, and from Minembwe neighbourhood, which has been attacked at least six times. Burundian groups have taken in these attacks on civilians, alongside Maimai armed groups. These allies all appear to be fighting a proxy war with Rwanda; yet Rwanda is not at all supporting their erstwhile ‘adoptees’, the Banyamulenge. Instead, the RPA appears to be disguising itself within those attacking and seeking to wipe out the Banyamulenge community. If this situation is allowed to continue, and there are many further assaults on this community, the outcome will be simply: the remaining Banyamulenge people will quite simply be wiped off the map. 6. Conclusion Failed and delayed processes of electoral democratization in both Burundi (2015) and in the Congo (2016), pushed South Kivu and Eastern DRC into a renewed cycle of irregular and proxy warfare after 2015. This has resulted in renewed violence targeting civilians, including Banyamulenge civilians. The Maimai ideology of fighting ‘invaders’ has resulted in a situation on the ground in which armed rebels from three other ethnic communities are supported by well-trained Burundian rebels, and now threaten to decimate the Banyamulenge ‘once and for all’. This is a cause for extreme concern, and I have shown why this crisis should now be considered an international priority in terms of genocide prevention. Having personally witnessed the war over many years, I am filled with a sense of despair at the non-recognition of the slow genocide taking place of the Banyamulenge people of South Kivu. One regional neighbour after another has now rejected the Banyamulenge as refugees. This includes Rwanda and Burundi, their supposed ‘natural allies’. Non-recognition of the vulnerability of the Banyamulenge community is the core problem. It creates a complete impasse for those left living in South Kivu, who have rapidly become ‘citizens of nowhere’, apparently wanted by nobody. Each step towards wiping out entirely the Banyamulenge of Eastern Congo has followed the ’10 stages of genocide’, from the 1960s onwards. When the Banyamulenge were forced to leave Ngandja localities in South Kivu, they were fleeing the Simba-Mulele rebels who had started to attack the community as ‘privileged elites’ because of their cattle. Today, when Banyamulenge want to pasture their cattle in Ngandja, they are accused of being ‘invaders’ once again. Post-independence, the Banyamulenge have been expelled from Katanga Province (Vyura and Moba) in 1998 and their cattle were decimated in looting by local militias supported by Laurent Kabila’s army (which the Banyamulenge fighters had helped put in place). After expulsion from Katanga, thousands of Banyamulenge were forced to relocate in South Kivu. Between 1996 and 1998, the Banyamulenge were again chased out of Ngandja and Mirimba, as ‘snake-vermin’, fleeing to different provinces in Congo. These killings followed the public announcement made by the 1996 governor of South-Kivu who called Banyamulenge to leave the homeland or face military strikes (Stearns 2011:58) [21]. The Governor’s declaration led to hundred Banyamulenge selectively killed by security services in their villages in South-Kivu. The same move happened in 1998 when rebellion erupted to overthrow Laurent Kabila. His Cabinet Chief of Staff called for an extinction of ‘vermin Tutsi’. Consequently, thousands of Banyamulenge soldiers were killed all over the Congo while serving in the national army (Ntanyoma 2019). Repeated incidents in which Banyamulenge have been killed or expelled as ‘foreigners’, are the precedent that reinforces the urgency of seeing the current mobilization via social media as part of a campaign of genocide against this community. The danger of genocide needs to be brought to the attention of world opinion. The wars and violence in Eastern DRC has led to serious loss of life, trauma and violence for all local communities, and not just for the Banyamulenge community. However, whilst other communities have united under the banner of autochthony and ‘Bantu’ loyalties, the Banyamulenge have almost no allies. Their situation of extreme vulnerability now needs to be acknowledged and should be a priority for the international community, since it involves the distinct risk of all-out genocide. There would be economic motives for this genocide, since the Banyamulenge’s right to use and own their lands have been contested. Meanwhile the national army remains incapable of protecting civilians, and can even turn on civilians, something that places the Banyamulenge people as a whole in danger. Recent reports confirm that members of the Banyamulenge community from across the region are now concentrated in a few small villages, around six to ten in total. As they lose their land to seizure and their cattle to looting, these ‘invaders’ are becoming more and more impoverished and vulnerable to attack. Their cattle, their main economic activity, are mostly gone now. Even the long-term presence of 20,000 MONUSCO forces, there to protect civilians from ‘irregular wars’, provides no security whatsoever to the Banyamulenge still alive in this region. Urgent attention is now required from the international community. The media and our leaders must speak about before it is too late for another group of this our human family. Footnotes 1. For instance, a former Chief of Staff of Laurent Desire Kabila has referred to Banyamulenge and Tutsi in general as ‘vermin, microbes’ to be systematically and methodically dealt with. Some clues of Ndombasi’s speech, its subsequent mobilization and style of killing can be found on this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZqmRZRW7UzU. The speech has been reproduced within local militias in Eastern Congo. 2. The paper lends the definition of genocide from Simon (1996:244) stipulating that “Genocide is the intentional killing of members of a group, negatively identified by perpetrators, because of their actual or perceived group affiliation”. 3. For details on the classification of 10 stages leading to Genocide, see Stanton, Gregory in “The Ten Stages of Genocide” accessible at http://genocidewatch.org/genocide/tenstagesofgenocide.html (accessed on 30th September 2019) 4. See Jackson, Stephen (2006) ‘Sons of Which Soil? The Language and Politics of Autochthony in Eastern DR Congo’. African Studies Review, 49:2 (2006) pp.95–124. 5. For the sake of keeping a single spelling, this article uses Maimai. However, this is a heterogenous group, differently spelled into the literature. They either called Maimai, Mai Mai, Mayimayi or simply Mai, meaning water as part of the historical beliefs in the power of witchcraft to turn bullets into water (Fox et al. 1965, Nzongola-Ntalaja 2002, Verhaegen 1967) 6. Bøås, Morten and Kevin Dunn (2014) ‘Peeling the onion: autochthony in North Kivu, DRC”. Peacebuilding, 2:2, 141-156, DOI: 10.1080/21647259.2014.910381 7. See for instance (Imbole 2018) on the declaration of Catholic Bishop Bodika Timothé of the former Bandundu Province, calling Banyamulenge cattle vendors in the Western Province as ‘invaders whose doubtful morphology are dangerous’. He was referring to the presence of Banyamulenge who were crossing the region to find potential market in Kinshasa. Everything was written on them. The former Prime Minister Adolphe Muzito has called an investigation to determine who are these vendors (see: https://www.radiookapi.net/2018/02/13/actualite/societe/affaire-des-zebus-adolphe-muzito-appelledes-mesures-dapaisement-pour) 8. For details on Kwebe Kimpele’s interviews in French, see the following link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nEbFIjQNLY&t=90s (accessed on 15th October 2019). With a datable stance on how customary chieftaincies are being exterminated by Tutsi in the Kivus, he calls those newly appointed as “de pacotille”, meaning useless. In the same vein, Christian Sita Mampuya, a leading Congolese figure in South Africa, has claimed that Minembwe Rural Municipality as part of invasion of foreigners willing to occupy Congo’s land (see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KqcijD5t4o&t=293s). Besides countless demonstrations contesting Minembwe Rural Municipality around the World (Arizona, Brussels, Manchester, Kinshasa, Goma, Bukavu..), the 2018 influential Presidential Candidate Martin Fayulu has too claimed Minembwe Rural Municipality is part of annexing parts of Congo to neighboring countries (see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZxErT85BIw&feature=youtu.be) 9. For details over how circle of violence and the vulnerability of Banyamulenge in South-Kivu, one can see Stearns et al. (2013) in “Mai-Mai Yakutumba: Resistance and Racketeering in Fizi, South-Kivu”; Vlassenroot, Koen (2013) in “South-Kivu: Identity, Territory, and Power in Eastern Congo”; Vlassenroot, Koen (2002) in” Citizenship, identity formation & conflict in South Kivu: the case of the Banyamulenge”; Court, Anthony (2013) in “The Banyamulenge of South Kivu: The ‘Nationality Question”; Verweijen, Judith (2015) in “From Autochthony to Violence? Discursive and Coercive Social Practices of the Mai-Mai in Fizi, Eastern DR Congo”; Baaz, Maria Eriksson and Judith Verweijen, (2013) in “The volatility of a Half-cooked Bouillabaisse: Rebel-Military Integration and Conflict Dynamics in the Eastern DRC” among others. 10. Gumino is an armed group recruiting mainly from Banyamulenge community. Gumino would literally mean “stay here” in Kinyamulenge, the language spoken by this community. Gumino stands as an offspring of 2002 Masunzu’s resistance under Forces Républicaines Fédéralistes (FRF). Since then, it split into Gumino (Bisogo-Makanika) and then Gumino (Tawimbi-Nyamusaraba). Details can be found in (Stearns 2013:26-40, Vlassenroot 2002:512) 11. As he talked the Beni’s case, he intended to mean how local population has been accusing the national army, specifically those belonging some ethnic groups. There have been alleged accusations that FARDC commanders who belong to ‘Rwandophones’ are part of the plot to exterminate local communities, namely Banande. This can be viewed from the Nande-Banyarwanda (Hutu-Tutsi) deep-seated struggles over power and resources. 12. Informal discussions with a Senior Officer Michel Rukunda (Uvira, 10th April 2019) 13. Interview with FM (Ruzizi Plain, 6th April 2019) and AG (Uvira, 5th April 2019 Uvira) had too raised his fear over what makes military officers to blind their eyes. 14. Criminalization―Mediavalization of violence refers to a situation in which violence creates popular prejudice and collective victimization. “Small-Irregular wars” reflect an environment where violent conflict has no frontiers between civilians and armed men; that is, there is no distinction between civilians and combatants. See Kaylvas (2003; 2006) for details. 15. Twirwaneho, sometimes called Twigwaneho may also means “Let’s defend ourselves”. For details over how this group has been formed, see (Verweijen and Brabant 2017:18) 16. For instance, one can check Honore Ngbanda, a former advisor to President Mobutu on Minembwe https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=77sMtKdBuiA). Along many Congolese channels, campaigns against a Rural Municipality have been going on for a while. The National South Africa TV has given an audience to Christian Mampuya in which he contested the existence of Banyamulenge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=2KqcijD5t4o 17. From the wider region of roughly 3,000 Km2, almost all villages of Banyamulenge were systematically burnt to ashes and they are not allowed to flee in different directions as do other members of their neighboring communities. Besides this type of concentration camps, Banyamulenge are regularly attacked from all sides and their properties systematically looted. 18. The Voice of America reportage from the ground had reported around 26.850 cattle looted between March-August 2019. Recent incidents that have been recorded in September culminated to around 6000 cows looted by Maimai militias in a coalition with Burundian groups. 19. The 3,000-4,000 Km2 is tentative estimation to give an idea of how large this region facing the humanitarian tragedy is. 20. Interviews avec Moise (2018) 21. Lwabanji Lwaboshi Ngabo is the 1996 South-Kivu governor who announced to expel Banyamulenge within a week. By mid-2019, he has been appointed as the Provincial Interior and Security Minister in South-Kivu. 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On the eve of a poll that many believe ‘could break America’, the US can learn a lot from Kenya’s election woes. Patrick Gathara | Al Jazeera. Fire consumed a market in Nairobi on Friday as election-related violence spread [Dai Kurokawa/European Pressphoto Agency] In an article entitled The Election That Could Break America meant for The Atlantic magazine’s November edition but published early online because of its “urgency”, Barton Gellman lays out the potentially scary scenario that could unfold in the United States in the likely event President Donald Trump loses the upcoming election and refuses to concede. In it, he argues the country is on the brink of an unprecedented electoral and constitutional crisis – heading into “a perfect storm of adverse conditions” that it cannot avoid. “On [Election Day] November 3,” he writes, “we sail toward its center mass. If we emerge without trauma, it will not be an unbreakable ship that has saved us.” While such waters may not be new to Americans, as he demonstrates, they have previously relied on the sensibilities of their politicians not to push too far into the tempest. This time, however, their ship’s captain seems determined to steer directly into it and there does not appear to be any way to stop him. The striking thing about this storm is it did not come out of the blue. It has been known for a long time that there were fundamental problems with the US electoral system, but until now, Americans have appeared to take peaceful elections and official handovers for granted – “our Constitution does not secure the peaceful transition of power, but rather presupposes it,” Gellman quotes from one US legal scholar. Yet, as people in the rest of the world know, presidential elections can destroy nations. And, like with the coronavirus pandemic, it is the countries which thought themselves the most prepared that turn out to be the most vulnerable. After more than two centuries of largely peaceful, if not always free and fair, elections, Americans have become complacent, assuming disputed elections do not pose a particularly significant threat – in any case, nothing on a par with “illegal” immigration or Iranian bombs. Kenya, on the other hand, has had a depressing familiarity with stolen elections and the havoc they can wreak. Like the Americans, and despite all the evidence to the contrary, Kenyans used to consider their country immune to the dangers of poor electoral systems. Sure, all the elections since the reintroduction of a multiparty political system had been accompanied by a measure of violence. However, the troubles confined to the peripheries were stage-managed by the state, and so did not seem to threaten the country in the same way political conflict had doomed most of our neighbours. Kenya, we told ourselves, was an island of peace in a sea of chaos. December 2002 brought the most peaceful election yet, ended the 40-year dominance of the independence party KANU and sent the late dictator Daniel Moi into retirement. The zenith was reached three years later when the government lost a national referendum conducted almost without incident. Kenyan democracy was on an unstoppable march and the spectre of dangerous plebiscites had been exorcised. Yet just two years later, in December 2007, the country convulsed in election-related blood-letting that officially left at least 1,300 dead and myriads more injured, raped and displaced. It threatened to tear apart the very fabric of the country and, combined with a traumatic history, has left a deep-seated terror of elections ever since. A few years back, many would have scoffed at the idea that the US could learn something about democracy and elections from countries like Kenya, which has been independent for less than 60 years and which would probably be included in Trump’s list of “s***hole” nations. However, that hubris has been effectively deflated by the inability to contain his ineptitude and rising authoritarianism over the last four years. It turns out our ships may not be all that different after all. As part of the settlement that ended the 2007 post-election violence, Kenya created a commission of inquiry to look into the electoral system and make recommendations on how to repair it. Headed by a respected South African judge, Johann Kriegler, it came up with a series of fixes most of which were ignored by a political class more interested in maintaining its ability to manipulate elections than in ensuring the polls were free and fair. As a result, presidential elections in Kenya have continued to be traumatic affairs, run on a system that has little popular credibility, resulting in predictable court challenges and, in one case, in 2017, an annulment which led to yet another non-credible election. In two years’ time, the country will again face another election and to date, there has been nothing done to fix the problems that afflicted the previous ones. Like Kenya, which should perhaps know better, the US is a country blindly sailing into troubled waters in a rickety ship guided solely by faith that nothing will seriously go wrong. As Gellman points out, it is already too late to create a sturdier vessel but on the other side of the tempest, there will be an opportunity to revisit the problems. The lesson from Kenya is that Americans must not allow that opportunity to pass nor allow their politicians to lull them back into a false sense of security till the next presidential contest. In the words of John Adams, the second US president, ensuring credible elections will teach representatives “the great political virtues of humility, patience and moderation without which every man in power becomes a ravenous beast of prey”. And this lesson stretches beyond elections. Trump’s tenure has also exposed fundamental weaknesses and flaws in American democracy, in its ability to contain a rogue president and to hold them to account, and its reliance on the goodwill of its politicians to function. Nearly 170 years ago, when the US would have been just slightly older than Kenya is today, the lawyer and orator Wendell Phillips warned that: “The hand entrusted with power becomes … the necessary enemy of the people.” Depending on the goodwill of public officials, as Trump has demonstrated, is the broad road to hell. Today it is a road paved with the souls of 200,000 COVID-19 victims. Strengthening oversight mechanisms and imposing real limitations on the power of the presidency would be the only way to prevent, as Phillips went on to say, an incumbent “hardening into a despot”. Kenyans have so far failed to do this. There is no reason why Americans should. Published by Al Jazeera September 29, 2020. © 2020 Al Jazeera Media Network.

Published by International Christian Concern on October 5, 2020. Pastoralists and their cattle in Sokoto district in north-west Nigeria (Luis Tato/AFP via Getty Images). According to Morning Star News, radical Fulani militants have killed multiple Christians in Nigeria’s Plateau and Kaduna states. Among the victims was a six-year-old Christian boy. On September 23, over 100 Fulani militants attacked Christian villagers in their fields in Jol village, severely injuring nine men with machetes. A few hours later, a mother and her son suffered fatal injuries by militant machetes in neighboring Sopp village. On September 28, in the Miango district, Fulani militants attacked three children; the youngest was six-year-old Emmanuel David. Four days before, the militants also killed five men, including a church leader from the Church of Christ in National (COCIN). COCIN reported to Morning Star News a surge in planned attacks, coordinated by predominantly radical Fulani herdsmen. According to COCIN, the militants are attempting to kill as many Christian farmers as possible and keep them from cultivating their agricultural lands. According to Open Doors’ 2020 World Watch List, Nigeria ranks number 12, where Christians are the most persecuted for their faith. ©2020 International Christian Concern - All Rights Reserved.

South Africa often makes the headlines for violent attacks against immigrants. Xenophobia has now reached a new level with the creation of a group calling itself Put South Africa First. The movement Put South Africa First, which first appeared on social media, is seen as a cause for alarm by human rights defenders and foreign nationals, especially after it mobilized dozens of people for a march to the Nigerian and Zimbabwean embassies in Pretoria last week. The protesters demanded that undocumented immigrants, or those involved in criminal activities, leave South Africa. One of the protest organizers, Nandisa Gschwari, warned that more demonstrations were to come. She told DW that she didn't care if the movement was called xenophobic. "Children are going missing every day, and our government is not doing anything about it. Nigerians are known to be at the top of the list," she said. Unfounded allegations Without presenting any evidence, the movement alleges that foreign nationals are mainly responsible for crimes ranging from robbery, sex slavery, kidnappings, and human trafficking to the peddling of drugs. Some of its leaders, like Ike Khumalo, went as far as demanding that immigrants be denied their rights. Khumalo told DW that even those documented should no longer enjoy the same rights as South Africans. "Our constitution should also be amended because our constitution is a problem," he said, insisting that a constitution should be valid for South Africans only. South Africa has a history of violence against foreigners. Xenophobic attacks left at least 62 people dead in 2008. Seven others were killed in 2015. Violence flared again in September last year when armed mobs attacked foreign-owned businesses in Johannesburg. The clashes left at least 12 people dead. Weak response from the authorities South African authorities took their time in acknowledging that the violence was motivated by xenophobia, preferring to classify it as crime driven. A year and a half ago, the government adopted a plan to fight xenophobia. So far, it seems to have borne little fruit. Ambiguous statements by some politicians are seen as fueling hatred against foreigners. A recent report by the non-governmental organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) accused law enforcement officials of being complicit in the violence, often operating in "discriminatory" and "abusive ways" towards non-nationals. It claimed that crackdowns on counterfeit goods disproportionately targeted foreign-owned businesses and that migrants were being arbitrarily detained for allegedly lacking the proper documents. According to HRW, police are reluctant to protect immigrants and investigate crimes against foreigners. Migrants in South Africa are often blamed for the loss of jobs and dire economic situation The Put South Africa First movement, the first organized group to openly say that solving South Africa's unemployment, crime, and social problems must include sending non-nationals back to their countries, is seen as cause for alarm by observers. Looking for scapegoats South Africans are feeling the pinch of COVID-19, which destroyed thousands of jobs in both the formal and informal sectors. The pandemic exacerbated an already dire economic situation, tempting many to use foreigners as scapegoats, said Frans Viljoen, Director at the Human Rights Centre at the University of Pretoria. "It is a deflection and inappropriate to target non-nationals in South Africa. We all know that after COVID-19, the economic stagnation created unease, and there is a quest to look for blame." Nigerian ambassador to South Africa Karibu Bala agrees. "We are deeply concerned when Nigerians and indeed African nationals of foreign origin in South Africa are bashed left, right and center by individuals or groups of individuals for whatever reason. We are like endangered species. We are always the scapegoat when things are hot in South Africa, and it's to be condemned," he said. South Africa has long been a magnet for economic migrants searching for better job prospects in the region. The country attracts people not only from neighboring Lesotho, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe, but also Congo, Ethiopia, Malawi, Nigeria, and South Asia. The county's last population census, in 2011, counted more than 2.2 million foreigners. © 2020 Deutsche Welle

Canada and the United Kingdom have announced sanctions on several senior officials in Belarus, including its authoritarian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka, as international pressure continues to build over a disputed presidential election last month and subsequent police crackdown on opposition members, media, and protesters. The two Commonwealth nations announced on September 29 joint sanctions including a travel ban and asset freeze “to send a clear message” to Lukashenka’s “violent and fraudulent regime." "We will hold those responsible for the thuggery deployed against the Belarusian people to account and we will stand up for our values of democracy and human rights," U.K. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said. Canada’s Foreign Ministry added in a statement: "Since the fraudulent presidential elections in August 2020, the government of Belarus has conducted a systematic campaign of repression and state-sponsored violence against public protests and the activities of opposition groups." Those sanctioned are Lukashenka, his son Viktar, Presidential Chief of Staff Ihar Syarheyenka, Interior Minister Yury Karayeu, Deputy Interior Ministers Alyaksandr Barsukou and Yury Nazaranka, Deputy Internal Troop Commander Khazalbek Atabekau, and Minsk Riot Police Chief Dzmitry Balaba. The sanctions announcement comes hours after French President Emmanuel Macron promised Europe's help in mediating the political crisis in Belarus after meeting with opposition leader Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya in Lithuania. Macron called for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to handle mediation on Belarus, which has seen weeks of mass demonstrations triggered by a disputed August 9 presidential election. The opposition leader said the French president "promised us to do everything to help with negotiations [during] this political crisis in our country...and he will do everything to help to release all the political prisoners." Tsikhanouskaya told AFP that she had accepted an invitation to speak at the French parliament, where officials said she would address the lower house's Foreign Affairs Committee. No further details were provided. Meanwhile, her press secretary, Anna Krasulina, told Reuters the opposition leader planned to visit Berlin on October 5-6 and that a meeting with Chancellor Angela Merkel was being considered during the trip. Macron is the highest-profile Western leader to visit Tsikhanouskaya, who fled to Lithuania amid a crackdown on protesters by long-ruling strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka following the presidential election. Lukashenka claims he won the vote, but the opposition has held mass rallies to protest the results, saying Tsikhanouskaya is the winner. The Interior Ministry said more than 350 people were detained during nationwide protests on September 27, bringing the total number of detentions over the weekend to about 500. Western governments have refused to recognize Lukashenka as the legitimate leader of Belarus and have called on him to negotiate a transfer of power, which Lukashenka refuses to do. He was secretly sworn in on September 23, sparking outrage at home and abroad. Under increasing pressure from the street and the West, Lukashenka has leaned on neighboring Russia for political and economic support. In a video message for the participants of the Forum of Regions of Russia and Belarus on September 29, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Belarus was in a "difficult situation" and facing "unprecedented external pressure." Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, later downplayed Macron's meeting with Tsikhanouskaya, describing it as a meeting between the "French president and a Belarusian citizen." Ahead of his three-day trip to Lithuania and neighboring Latvia, Macron said it was clear that Lukashenka "has to go" after 26 years in power. Over the past year, Macron has tried to reduce distrust between Russia and the West. But the efforts have upset other EU governments, particularly those that escaped Moscow's orbit after the Cold War. They say little has changed to merit a thaw in relations. Other European Union leaders have called on Macron to review his stance toward Moscow since the poisoning of Aleksei Navalny, a longtime critic of Putin. German doctors found traces of a nerve agent in Navalny's body and his allies accuse the Kremlin of being behind the poisoning. Moscow denies the accusation but has resisted pressure to launch a criminal investigation. © 2020 Radio Free Europe

Amnesty International says it has been forced to halt its India operations due to "reprisals" from the government. The watchdog says it has had to suspend its campaign and research work in India (file photo) [Getty Images] The watchdog has also accused the government of indulging in a "witch-hunt of human rights organisations". Amnesty says its bank accounts have been frozen and it's been forced to lay off staff in the country, and suspend all its campaign and research work. The government is yet to respond to the allegations. "We are facing a rather unprecedented situation in India. Amnesty International India has been facing an onslaught of attacks, bullying and harassment by the government in a very systematic manner," Rajat Khosla, the group's senior director of research, advocacy and policy, told the BBC. "This is all down to the human rights work that we were doing and the government not wanting to answer questions we raised, whether it's in terms of our investigations into the Delhi riots, or the silencing of voices in Jammu and Kashmir." In a report released last month, the group said police in the Indian capital, Delhi, committed human rights violations during deadly religious riots between Hindus and Muslims in February. Rebutting the claims, the Delhi police told The Hindu newspaper that Amnesty's report was "lopsided, biased and malicious". Earlier in August, on the first anniversary of the revocation of Indian-administered Kashmir's special status, Amnesty had called for the release of all detained political leaders, activists and journalists, and for the resumption of high-speed internet services in the region. In 2019, the watchdog testified before the US Foreign Affairs Committee during a hearing on human rights in South Asia, where it highlighted its findings on arbitrary detentions, and the use of excessive force and torture in Kashmir. Amnesty has also repeatedly condemned what it says is a crackdown on dissent in India. The group, which has faced scrutiny by different government agencies over the past few years, says the freezing of its bank accounts earlier this month was the final straw. In August 2016, a case of sedition was filed against Amnesty India over allegations that anti-India slogans were raised at one of its events. Three years later, a court ordered the charges to be dropped. Amnesty International accuses India police of rights abuses Article 370: What happened with Kashmir and why it matters In October 2018, the group's offices in the southern city of Bangalore were raided by the Enforcement Directorate, which investigates financial crimes. Its accounts were frozen then too, but Amnesty says it was able to access them after seeking a court's intervention. In early 2019, the group says dozens of its small donors were sent letters by the country's income tax department. And later in the same year, Amnesty's offices were raided again, this time by the Central Bureau of Investigation, based on a case registered by India's home affairs ministry. India has had a fraught relationship with Kashmir for decades [Getty Images] Successive governments in India have been wary of foreign funded non-profit, particularly human rights organisations. Amnesty had previously suspended its India operations in 2009, because of what the group said was repeated rejection of their licence to receive funds from overseas. India was then ruled by a Congress-led government, which sits in opposition now. Over the years rules surrounding receiving foreign funds have been tightened, and thousands of non-profit groups have been banned from receiving money from overseas. The current government has previously stated that Amnesty was being investigated over suspicions that the group was violating Indian laws surrounding foreign funding. "That's a blatant lie. Amnesty India is in full compliance of all domestic legal requirements and international legal requirements as well," Mr Khosla told the BBC. The group's announcement comes amid growing concern over the state of free speech in India. The development, activists say, could dent India's long-standing reputation of being a thriving democracy. "India does not stand in good company with these moves it is making. We operate in over 70 countries, and the only other country previously that we had been forced to shut operations in was Russia in 2016," says Mr Khosla. "I hope people around the world sit up and take notice. We are doing this with a very heavy heart, and a deep sense of anguish and grief." The group says it will continue to fight its legal cases in India. Link to article here. © 2020 BBC News

In his UN General Assembly speech, Pakistani leader also denounces India’s moves to cement control of Muslim-majority Kashmir. Khan also spoke about Pakistan's coronavirus response and called for debt relief for poor nations amid the pandemic [Aamir Qureshi/AFP] In a speech to the United Nations, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan called India’s Hindu-nationalist government a sponsor of hatred and prejudice against Islam, while denouncing its moves to cement control of Muslim-majority Kashmir. Addressing the UN General Assembly (UNGA) on Friday, Khan said Islamophobia prevails in India today and threatens the nearly 200 million Muslims who live there. “The one country in the world today where, I am sad to say, the state sponsors Islamophobia, is India. The reason behind this is RSS ideology that unfortunately rules India today,” Khan said in a recorded speech to the UNGA, which is being held virtually amid the coronavirus pandemic. “They believe that India is exclusive to Hindus and others are not equal citizens.” Pakistan PM has frequently criticised the decision by the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi last August to strip Jammu and Kashmir of its statehood, scrap its separate constitution and remove inherited protections on land and jobs. India’s security clampdown sparked protests, and UN-appointed independent experts have called on the Indian government to take urgent action. India accuses Pakistan of arming and training rebels fighting for Kashmir’s independence from India. Pakistan denies the charge and says it offers only diplomatic and moral support to the rebels. "They believe that India is exclusive to Hindus and others are not equal citizens" - IMRAN KHAN, PAKISTAN PM The Kashmir region is split between India and Pakistan, which have fought two wars over the territory while claiming the region in its entirety. “There will be no durable peace and stability in South Asia until the Jammu and Kashmir dispute is resolved on the basis of international legitimacy,” Khan said, calling for a peaceful solution and a rescinding of India’s August 5 move. Residents of the heavily militarised Indian-administered Kashmir say security forces have arrested thousands of young men, raided people’s homes, inflicted beatings and electric shocks, and threatened to take away and marry their female relatives. Thousands of protesters over the past year have been wounded in pellet-gun attacks, including hundreds blinded in one or both eyes. For seven months, until March, the area was under a communications blackout with social media and internet access banned. “The international community must investigate these grave violations and prosecute the Indian civil and military personnel involved in state terrorism and serious crimes against humanity.” Khan, as he did in his speech before the world body last year, also condemned the targeting of Muslims in many countries and provocations and incitement “in the name of free speech”. “Incidents in Europe, including republication of blasphemous sketches by Charlie Hebdo, are recent examples,” he said. The French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo reprinted the Prophet Mohammed caricatures this month that were first published in 2015. See article here. Published by Al Jazeera September 25, 2020. © 2020 Al Jazeera Media Network

There is no end in sight to the crisis in Cameroon's North-West and South-West regions despite initial ceasefire talks with rebels seeking independence from the government in Yaoundé. The Cameroonian government launched secret talks with jailed Anglophone leader Ayuk Tabe and nine others at the beginning of July in an effort to negotiate a ceasefire with separatists after a four-year bloody civil war that the United Nations says has killed at least 2,000 people. But the crisis is unlikely to be resolved until all the major forces get around the negotiating table and hammer out a deal that responds to the rebels concerns about the English-speaking regions’ marginalisation and governance. Little progress is currently being made. Prime Minister Joseph Dion Ngute and secretary general of the presidency Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh are jockeying for influence over the peace talks, which has contributed to their stalemate. In the meantime, civil society groups have been putting pressure on national and international actors to take into account the human suffering that the conflict has caused and to push for peace talks to progress. Talking with Tabe Tabe, the president of the unrecognised Federal Government of the Republic of Ambazonia, and the nine who participated are serving life in prison sentences for what the government has called terrorist-related activities. The government’s approach shows that this is a political crisis, not a military one, a point that seems to be penetrating the corridors of power in Yaounde, according to Christopher Fomunyoh, regional director of the US-based National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI). “It’s a cumulative effect of multiple events that have now gotten to the point where the country is beginning to think it’s proper to provide some overtures to begin to lay the groundwork for negotiations,” says Cameroon expert Fomunyoh. A 90-day ceasefire to create a humanitarian corridor and access for medical staff to treat possible COVID-19 cases in the Anglophone regions was initially supported by UN secretary-general António Guterres. It was pushed by the UN Security Council as a way of ending hostilities between the Cameroonian security forces on the ground in the two Anglophone regions and the armed Ambazonia separatists. “Ultimately, for negotiations to be taken seriously, and for them to be effective, there needs to be a more public affirmation of the government’s commitment to negotiations, and then the ground rules can be laid out,” says Fomunyoh. Although the initial meeting was supposed to be a secret, the fact that it took place shows that there is a determination by the government to try and resolve the Anglophone crisis, according to Fomunyoh. The four years of fighting in the Anglophone regions of Cameroon has a taken a toll on the country, says Fomunyoh. “The operations on the ground are becoming extremely expensive, both in terms of human casualties and economic exhaustion.” “It gave pause to a number of people within the regime who’ve been working so hard to make sure that the crisis stayed beneath the radar,” adds Fomunyoh, saying that civil society and the media have also put pressure on the government to help end the conflict. The rebels says that they want the government to withdraw troops from the North-West and South-West to show that is coming to the table in good faith. That is something that Yaoundé has not been keen to accept. Lack of trust After October 2019’s government-led national dialogue fell flat, those on the ground argue that the government must make a greater effort. The Federal Republic of Ambazonia’s communication secretary Chris Anu says the fact that the government chose particular separatists languishing in jail is the same tactic it used to select separatists for the failed national dialogue. “It’s an empty exercise,” he tells The Africa Report. The skirmishes and killings show that this is not a country that wants a ceasefire, says separatist leader Ayaba Cho Lucas. “We are facing an ongoing, situation of massacres, brutality, burning down villages. Cameroon has refused to commit to any process that can be internationally monitored and implemented,” says Ayaba. “So we cannot unilaterally declare ceasefire. We cannot commit to a ceasefire…because we are the only protectors of our people at this particular stage in the absence of the UN invoking its responsibility to protect,” he adds. Suffering populations The Cameroonian government has called out the separatists for burning down schools and terrorising the population, calling the separatists terrorists. In light of the attacks that both sides accuse each other of, the ceasefire must be the first step, notes analyst Fomunyoh. “Every gesture that the government makes without a ceasefire would be interpreted as a ruse to distract, to have the Anglophones lay down their guard, while you try to declare a military victory and not yield on any of the grievances that have been put forward,” he says. Mediators are watching to see what the government’s next steps are – especially with the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. “If nothing is done, it [COVID-19] could spread very quickly within a population that’s already on its knees. I believe, though, that were the government to announce a ceasefire, that that would trigger a lot of other positive developments, because it would make it harder for the ‘Amba boys’ to carry out any activities that could be seen as violent,” says Fomunyoh. Some agreement among Ambazonians While there are divisions amongst the various Ambazonian factions, Ayaba maintains that they are in regular contact with each other. Ayaba and Anu lay out their demands for future negotiations: They should take place outside of Cameroon. All separatists should be allowed to come to the table, rather than being handpicked by Yaoundé. A trusted international actor should mediate the discussions. “If the ceasefire was the first thing on the table, we would be willing to talk about what type of ceasefire” could be carried out, says Anu. “Ambazonian fighters have not crossed in to French Cameroon to attack, [or] to attack their soldiers in their part of the country,” adds Anu. “The refugees are our people, the internally displaced are our people.” As the rebels lack the military means to push the government back and the government does not have the political will to end the crisis, the status quo could continue for quite some time. Published by The Africa Report September 9, 2020. Copyright © 2020 The Africa Report. All Rights Reserved.