Congo

The situation in Congo keeps rolling around in my mind. As I have chatted with a few people about it in the west, I realize that little is being reported on it.

In the last weeks, over 9000 refugees have come into Rwanda from Eastern Congo. More are coming each day into a transitional refugee camp. Even more have taken refuge in Uganda.

There are 4 Congolese camps in Rwanda. Two of them are full. We wait to see if the camp we work in will gain more refugees.

Why more refugees from Eastern Congo?

Well... the situation in Eastern Congo has not been stable for years ... or let's try since colonization when people in Europe took a map and redrew the borders around resources rather than taking into consideration the people that actually lived on the land. Classic.

Since the end of the genocide in Rwanda, the flee of genociders into Eastern Congo and them finding more people with Rwandan history to kill ( land in Congo, twice the size for Rwanda today, used to be Rwanda, hence people with Rwandan history!) and the UN being peacekeeping mission, not a peace making mission... well, some years have been better than others. Not to mention how complicated the situation is. Over 3.5 million people have been killed in Eastern Congo since the genocide in Rwanda - same conflict but who's talking about it? Not many ...

Right now ... life is not good.

On Sunday we were at a family dowry giving. Serge and I caught up with an uncle who lives and has a small NGO in Eastern Congo. They are doing their best to look after 250 of the refugees. 15 of the women have been been raped. There are reports of hundreds of rapes ...

Serge said to me this morning... my people have no home.

God have mercy.