New Crisis in Congo

Tension is rising in the Democratic Republic of Congo, after President Laurent Kabila issued an arrest warrant for one his generals, former warlord, Bosco Ntaganda.

Ntaganda has gone AWOL with many of his commanders. He’s believed to be in the eastern province of North Kivu where has many supporters, and where he waged war for most of the last decade until a peace deal in 2009.

Ntaganda has been wanted for years by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the Hague for war crimes. But President Kabila has until now ignored the ICC warrant.

According to reporter, Michael Kavanagh in Kinshasa, “Kabila has been saying since 2009 that he cared first and foremost about peace, and then about justice”, and that preserving stability in the east among Ntaganda’s Tutsi people was more important than prosecuting him. “Now it seems that Kabila no longer thinks that’s true.”

Kabila and Ntaganda could easily come to blows, says Kavanagh. If so, “there could be small war.”