Tuesday, March 17, 2009

What Sparked Rwanda's Incursion?

HUGE NEWS from Stop the War in North Kivu:
On March 2nd, the US based company Contour Global announced the investment of 325 million U$ to develop a gas extraction and electricity generation facility which “will provide 100 MW of natural gas fired electricity to Rwanda and the East African Region”. According to Contour Global, this is the biggest investment in the history of Rwanda (you can download the press release here).

The Rwandan army finished the joint military operation and left Congolese soil on February 27th.

Of course, both news have no link to each other.
All those questions we had... Why, after years of fighting, did Rwanda and Congo suddenly reach an agreement this year? Why did Rwanda claim to be pre-occupied with the FDLR--when they haven't done squat about the FDLR in years? Why did they proclaim Mission Accomplished when it was self-evident that they hadn't begun to round up a significant number of FDLR forces? Suddenly it all makes sense. This had nothing to do with Peace. The Rwandans needed to establish a safe perimeter around Lake Kivu to reassure the investors. The Congo was no doubt promised a portion of the money and the electricity that the facility will generate in return for its cooperation. Or more accurately: Kabila no doubt received a kickback for signing off on this arrangement. It's a win-win for everyone but the people of Kivu.

No comments:

Post a Comment