Nowhere Left To Hide

Two Hundred Thousand Children At Risk
(Part of the Lost Childhood series)

 

 Within twenty four hours of capturing Goma the Congolese rebels of M23 began their search for anyone loyal to the government. Those who had worked for the city were hunted down and executed in mass. Anyone who had ties to the military were also rounded up and killed. The numbers of how many were killed are still being estimated as the rebels prepare to move onto their next city.

As for the 200,000 estimated children (under the age of 18) within Goma, the roundups are still happening. These children are now at risk of being forced into conscription with the M23 rebels. This would mean that they would be turned into child soldiers and used as slave labor by the rebel army. Their task would be more dangerous than their adult captors. They could be facing task such as placing landmines, running ammunition under fire, and fetching weapons off fallen soldiers. 

According to UNICEF around 600 children are in immediate danger due to having been separated by from their families. "We know from the recent practices of the groups involved in this latest fighting that unaccompanied children in this part of DRC are in immediate and real danger of forcible recruitment into armed groups," reported World Vision. Once again it is important to remember that nobody can say for sure how many children are being forced into the rebel army. Yet reports of forced recruitment are coming in. 

"Children have nowhere to turn, we can't get to them, and we are hearing reports of groups arming people around Goma. Local partners have seen armed people passing guns and ammunition to civilians this morning, including children aged 16-18. A former child soldier we have worked with in the past told us today: 'I have seen some of my friends receiving weapons and going to fight... they are being told to go and fight the rebels and take their guns'." As reported by World Vision.

These children are, just as everyone else in Goma, afraid and lost as confusion sets in and lawlessness take over. Loyalist are just as likely to take advantage of this sense of helplessness as they too force children into makeshift militias in an attempt to fight off the M23 rebels... something the Congolese military refused to do. With this irony the children of Goma are quickly finding themselves with nowhere left to hide.

Organizations like World Vision and UNICEF are urgently petitioning the government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to take action to stop this criminal activity. Many of the human rights groups working in the area have tried to get permission to enter the conflict areas to rescue innocent civilians caught up in the battle. However it is more than likely that nobody will be able to reach the conflict region until most of the atrocities and crimes have already been committed.

As the M23 rebels prepare to march on their next target, Kinshasa, the citizens of Goma will continue to suffer mass executions, gang rapes of women and children, and the looting of their homes and businesses. One can only hope that the majority of the 200,000 children of Goma will escape with their lives.... and avoid the horrors of becoming a child soldier.

Hide And Go Seek

Rebels Accused of Using Children as Weapons.
(Part of the Lost Childhood series)

(Children of Refugees in the Congo)

As the rebel group M23 marched into Goma, in the eastern part of the Congo, they bore weapons more sophisticated than most Congolese soldiers. Rwanda, and Uganda to an extent, have been funding these barbaric rebels and supplying weaponry such as night vision goggles and 120mm mortars. And for this reason the Democratic Republic of Congo's government has declared the M23 rebels are nothing more than "mercenaries". 

For the children of Goma, a city of nearly 1 million people, the approach of the M23 rebels was a sign of terror. It has been recorded that the rebels have in the past and currently engage in the deployment of child soldiers. These young combatants are often forced into battle against their will. And those who do not fight are often killed by the forces that brought them into the war in the first place. 

So far the United States has imposed sanctions upon the M23 rebels for the use of child soldiers. This measure is odd in the light of Obama's decision to relax sanctions on the government of the Congo itself. Meaning that while the United States is going to be sending goods and providing aid to a government that fled Goma like dogs with their tails between their legs. So it is hard to imagine that any aid provided would somehow not make its way into rebel hands. 

Meanwhile both the United States and the United Kingdom both offer aid to Rwanda and have lucrative trade deals with their ally in the region. It is now questionable whether or not this very aid provided to Rwanda is simply being funneled into M23 rebels' hands. And if the aid is being diverted into a proxy war with the Congolese government then any sanction imposed upon the Congo will further aid the rebels. 

As for the children trapped in the path of the M23 rebels the horrors of war still await. An untold number of children will be forced to flee as the rebels attack their villages. Others could face the terror of being forced to fight for the rebels. But most could simply grow up in refugee camps facing starvation, disease, and the lack of what could be considered a normal childhood. 

All of this could be prevented however. UN peacekeepers could be given a mandate to engage and stop the march of the M23 rebels across the eastern part of the Congo. Currently the UN peacekeepers (MONUSCO) can not and do not fight back against rebel attacks. Instead of defending the international airport in Goma, the UN stood down. Their actions helped the rebels in their war against the Congolese government. 

If the UN does not change its approach to defending even the most basic of human rights we could be watching Rwanda play out its genocide on foreign soil.

Cheap Never Cost So Much

Exploitation of the New Holocaust
(Part of The Darkness Visible series)

(The Hell of Eastern Congo)

In 2012 the genocide in the Congo surpassed the estimated deaths of Jews in the Holocaust. The fact that the world remains silent has left some of us cynical jaded souls asking if the victims in the Congo were just born the wrong color? Would the world care more if these 6,100,000 souls been cared for a little more if they had just been born white? 

In 1994 the Hutu militias and Hutu civilians who had been defeated after committing genocide in neighboring Rwanda fled into what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Their presence there brought forth the sins they had committed in Rwanda. With their bloody hands came the crimes that had driven them from their homeland. Every since 1996 the Congo has been paying the price of war and genocide. 

Rebel armies rape, pillage, and torture innocent civilians daily in Eastern Congo and the Northern Congo. Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, a Hutu extremist group, continues to terrorize the eastern areas of the Congo. The Lord's Resistance Army, despite President Obama's claims, continue to force famine upon the northern areas of the Congo and abduct innocent children. 

In recent years organizations like "Invisible Children" have taken up the cause of the victims of groups like The Lord's Resistance Army. But even these good intentioned organizations fail to recognize that the use of children soldiers is just a symptom of genocide in the region. Those who support organizations like "Invisible Children" also seem blind to the fact that an estimated 45,000 people die each month in the Congo. This estimation includes more than just children and women (though women and children do suffer disproportionately). It includes all Congolese citizens who refuse to support and participate in the killing of their neighbors and families. 

What makes the Congo genocide unique however is not the religion or race of the victims. This is a genocide that challenges the definition of genocide itself. This is a genocide that targets those who happen to be in the way. They happen to live on land that is rich in resources and minerals that are far to precious for the Western world to ignore. Instead it is the victim that is ignored while the diamonds, gold, silver, and lumber are pillaged by rabid governments in the developed world. 

This is where the color of the victims skin seems to show the tale tale signs of willful ignorance and neglect by the Western world. 

It is expected of China and Russia that they would support regimes like that in the Sudan and Iran when they exploit their citizens to boost the private wealth of those in charge of the victimized country. Communism does not preach to the impoverished the core values of human rights. It does not teach its citizens that all people are equated equal and with inalienable rights endowed to them by G-d. It only teaches its citizens that their own welfare is important and that the desire of the masses must be met despite the suffering of the few. 

So why is it that the United States and Canada alike seem far to willing to allow companies who operate within their borders to exploit and prop up genocidal regimes like those in the Congo? 

This year President Obama lifted sanctions on American based companies doing business in Myanmar. It is unfortunate that Mr. Obama never had to bother with lifting sanctions on American businesses that would prevent them from doing business in the Congo. Instead American mining companies and natural resource purchasing companies in the United States have long been doing their business with Congo based war lords. And in Canada the government decided to drop a piece of legislation that would have blocked Canadian businesses who currently import Congolese resources. 

This failure to pass any from of sanctions against the Congolese war lords has allowed for Western cash to continue to fund genocide in the Congo. This constant flow has boosted the flow of blood in the worlds second poorest nation. At the same time the 24 trillion US dollars worth of resources continues to be picked clean as greed fuels the flames of the hellish genocide it supports. 

If we are ever going to see action taken to stop the killing in the Congo we must first force action in the governments of the Americas and Europe. We can no longer accept the word of companies when they assure us that the products we buy are not "blood diamonds" or "conflict minerals". These same companies still take your cash and send it to the killing fields so that they can use middle men to traffic the cheap resources back into the Western markets. Only actual laws and bills can put an end to the cash that fuels the genocides in developing nations like the Congo. 

This callousness to the suffering of Congolese citizens by Western markets leaves me jaded only that much more. And once again it leaves me asking... do these six million dead receive little acknowledgement simply because they aren't white? Or is it our greed that blinds us to the blood stains on our own hands?