Uganda's And United Nations' Despicable Travesty

[Black Star News Editorial September 23rd, 2008]

The United Nations is on the verge of embarrassing itself by committing a travesty of incurable proportions; member states may vote for Uganda, whose president's militarism may be responsible for nine million deaths in Africa, and several wars of aggression, to take a seat on the UN Security Council.

The outrage must be denounced and rejected.

The role of the United Nations Security Council is to protect and enforce international law; it is preposterous for a nation-state that wantonly and repeatedly violates these laws to sit on the Security Council.

In 2005, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) found Uganda liable for crimes against humanity, war crimes, massive destruction, and looting, as a result of its national army's occupation of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC): please see http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/files/116/10455.pdf

The United Nations itself as an organization was created to prevent these types of outrages against humanity.

Estimates of deaths in eastern Congo have reached seven million. Uganda was assessed $10 billion after the ICJ found it liable for the Congo crimes; not a single dollar has yet been paid. The Commander-in-Chief of Uganda's army is the president, Lt. General Yoweri K. Museveni. He is in New York this week addressing the General Assembly. It's because he enjoys US protection that he will not be served with an arrest warrant.

The Congo crimes, committed by Uganda troops and allied militias, and detailed in the World court's findings, include mass rapes –using sexual assault as an instrument of terror, which was hitherto unknown in Congo—mass killings, burnings of people alive in their huts, and theft of Congo's mineral and natural resources.

The ICC earlier this year indicted Jean Pierre Bemba, a Congolese warlord who was financed by Uganda, on separate war crimes; Bemba already is at the Hague awaiting trial. Human Rights Watch in a 2003 report, "Ituri: Covered In Blood," identified at least 10 militias it said were Uganda-backed. These insurgent organizations were accused of crimes against humanity and war crimes.

Congo's presidency, according to an article in The Wall Street Journal on June 8, 2006, referred the same allegations of crimes for which the ICJ found Uganda liable, to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague for criminal investigation.

According to the Wall Street Journal's report, once the court started its probe, Gen. Museveni contacted then U.N. Secretary General Annan and urged him to derail the ICC investigation. The Journal wrote: "President Museveni of Uganda asked U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to block the Congo investigation, according to one person familiar with the matter. Mr. Annan replied that he had no power to interfere with the court, this person said." [Editor's Emphasis]

Uganda also is tied to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

Whereas there had been relative peace between Hutu and Tutsi since the genocide that accompanied independence in the early 1960s, Uganda upset this delicate balance and re-ignited deep seated ethnic fears by invading Rwanda in October 1990; the warfare ended in genocide four years later after the assassination of Rwanda President Juvenal Habyarimana.

The officers that led the invasion into Rwanda were senior officers in the Ugandan army, including Fred Rwigyema and Paul Kagame; they were both sent for training in the United States by President Museveni before invading Rwanda. Citizens of Rwanda should contact a smart American lawyer and explore legal options against the United States for collaborating in the invasion that culminated in genocide.

Domestically, within Uganda itself, nearly 2 million ethnic Acholis, more than 90% of the population, have been confined inside death centers, where, according to a report by the World Health Organization (WHO), up to 1,000 civilians were dying per week through governmental neglect, resulting in starvation, dehydration, and deaths through treatable diseases.

Critics have denounced the Uganda government administered centers as "concentration camps" and the 10 to 15 years confinement as "slow motion genocide." Between 600,000 to one million Acholis may have died in these camps during the period of these illegal detentions over the last decade. Please see: http://130.94.183.89/parker/sub01wsu.html

By comparison, the number of civilians killed by the vicious Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels, during its 22 years war with the Uganda government, may not reach 22,000 since there has never been a report of 1,000 civilians being killed by the rebels in any one given year.

Now that the owners of fertile tracts of land in Acholi have been buried in mass graves, the Uganda government has cynically invited foreign investors to seize the land for commercial farming.

To reward General Museveni's regime–after being involved in the deaths of seven million Congolese; one million Rwandese, and possibly another million Ugandans in Acholi—with a seat on the Security Council amounts to the following:

(1) Travesty that exposes the United Nations and the Security Council to global ridicule, scorn, and contempt.

(2) Interfering with the ongoing ICC investigation of alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed against the people of DRC by Uganda's army and its allied militias, as already established by the ICJ. The UN would, incongruously, be inviting a suspect –commander in chief Lt. Gen. Museveni—in alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity to sit on the very body, the Security Council, which is empowered to either suspend or to not suspend an indictment by the ICC.

(3) Irreparably tarnishing the reputation of the Security Council; in particular challenging its mandate to end impunity of state and non-state actors.

(4) Squandering the moral stature of the Security Council, without which its authority is compromised and its actions rendered meaningless.

(5) Undermining the Security Council's ability to deal with future crises, including wars of aggression, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.

(6) Violating the UN's own charter, which forbids wars of aggression, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, which Uganda already has been established to have committed in DRC by the ICJ.

(7) Promoting future wars of aggression, war crimes and crimes against humanity, and genocide, since the Security Council would no longer be able to play any deterrence role, having been compromised by rewarding a country that already was found to have committed these crimes, to sit on the Security Council. Moreover, the UN has also condemned Uganda –as well as the Lord's Resistance Army rebels—for continued use and deployment of child soldiers in contravention of International laws. Please see: http://www.hrw.org/campaigns/crp/index.htm

(8) Emboldening the Ugandan dictatorship to continue human rights abuse domestically and wars of aggression, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, regionally, having nothing to fear from the United Nations and the international community.

(9) Betraying legitimate domestic opposition and resistance to the dictatorship, within Uganda.

(10) Confirming to the world that hypocrisy rules regardless of beautiful phrases such as "the rule of law" and "human rights."

In order for Uganda to be elected, it needs the support of the five countries that hold permanent seats on the Security Council –the United States, Russia, France, the United Kingdom, and China.

The Bush Administration is grateful to Museveni for sending a token military force to Somalia, ostensibly on a peace keeping mission; in reality, to shore up the U.S.-backed Ethiopian occupation.

Ironically, some members of the Uganda armed force now stationed in Somalia may have been involved in the Congo atrocities; the Bush Administration has been willing to disregard genocide in Africa as a result of General Museveni's militarism, in return for short-term gains.

Anyone with a sense of human dignity, or any organization that still takes human rights and the UN Charter seriously and is horrified by this outrageous travesty, should protest in the strongest possible terms to ambassadors from the Five Permanent Member countries on the Security Council.

Send your letter of protest, or an e-mail message, or forward this Black Star News editorial, or call and speak with the respective ambassadors of:

The United States usa@un.int (212) 415-4000 Fax (212) 415-4443 ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad;

China (212) 655-6100 fax (212) 481-2998 ambassador Wang Guangya;

Russia rusun@un.int (212) 861-4900/4901 Fax (212) 628-0252 ambassador Vitaly I. Churkin;

United Kingdom uk@un.int (212) 745-9200 Fax (212) 745-9316 ambassador Sir Emyr Jones Parry;

and, France france@un.int (212) 308-5700 Fax (212) 421-6889 ambassador Jean-Marc de La Sablière.

Also call the United States Department of State as register your outrage to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at (202) 647-2492 Fax (202) 647-0244.

Please copy your letters of protest to Milton@blackstarnews.com or faxes to(866) 242-9689.

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An Open Letter to Human Rights Colleagues Concerned About Darfur…and Iraq

To my dear and well-meaning Human Rights colleagues,

The story of displacement and death in the Darfur region of Sudan is indeed horrific. And, since Sudan is one of the few countries in Africa which has been off-limits to US oil deals and capital penetration, the crimes of the Sudanese government have a special resonance in U.S policy-making circles. Although it is rare that the Darfur tragedy is put into context, please permit me to try.

Actually, over the past two years 1.1 million Somalis have been displaced by the Ethiopian army(1) with the assistance of Rwandan army (both of which have been funded by our own government with the assistance of US military advisors and equipment) (2) and Somalia has displaced Sudan's Darfur, as the world's most dangerous region, awful as the Darfur crimes might be (3). We must also note that the attacks on Muslim Somalis by "Christian" Ethiopians/Rwandans have not been characterized as a "genocide" by US leaders, despite its larger-than-Darfur scale, although others have...



The awful number of civilian deaths in Darfur -- some 400,000 we are told -- has been eclipsed by the 6.4 million deaths in the Eastern Congo as a result of the invasion of the Eastern Congo by US/UK-supported armies of Uganda and Rwanda beginning in 1996 (5) which are continuing at the rate of 45,000 a month, today.

An October 2003 UN experts report describes how the economy and resources of the Congo have been stolen by Ugandan and Rwandan militaries, and their surrogates, during the ongoing, decades-long war in Central Africa (6) with not so much as "peep" from western HR advocates. And the killing is continuing as I write and you read these words. But no regular reporting has appeared in the US press. There has been no condemnation of any kind from USG and no human rights "movement" has materialized to condemn the invasion or the killing in the Congo, much less Somalia.

And, European Union Reports from 2003 make clear that the recent electoral debacle in Zimbabwe in 2008 was merely a repeat of similar tactics, such as physical attacks, arrests and deportation of the political opposition that occurred in Rwanda, when President Kagame was "elected" with 95% of the vote in 2003. (7) Interestingly, Zimbabwe has been almost completely cut-off from "western" economic aid -- with the predictable results in the African context.

By contrast, Uganda is Africa's largest recipient of UK military and economic aid, and Rwanda has a similar relationship with the U.S. Both countries have become centers for trading gold, diamonds and coltan(the rare mineral that makes cell phones possible). Although none of these resources exist in any quantities in either country, they DO exist in great plentitude in the Congo. US military aid to Rwanda has ballooned the Rwandan army from 7,000 (before Kagame's war 1990-1994 to seize power) to 70,000-100,000 to today.(8) Rwandan troops are now being "farmed-out" to the U.N. and U.S. allies for cash, not unlike the mercenaries, called military "contractors," being used in Iraq and elsewhere.

And, when we begin considering who the criminals are in Africa, it is worth noting that Zimbabwe's Mugabe had the poor judgement to send troops to the Congo to oppose the completely illegal Ugandan/Rwandan invasions that began in 1996 and are continuing today.

This is not to say that Darfur does not deserve our concern and attention, but when the U.S. State Department starts throwing around the "genocide" label, you can be pretty sure that the targeted African leaders are NOT favorites of U.S policy-makers. On the other hand, no matter WHAT crimes are committed by local despots that great-powers outside Africa support, much, much greater crimes (such as wars of aggression for economic gain) never get even a mention.

Because I am Lead Defense Counsel at the UN Tribunal for Rwanda, I have had access to original UN and U.S. Government documents that have been suppressed since mid-1994 but which are now in the record at the ICTR, and many of which are posted on the website of original source materials I have been creating to permit researchers to draw their own conclusions rather than accepting my or our Government's "spin" on the politics of Africa. Please check out http://www.rwandadocumentsproject.net/.

Also, please note that the Pentagon established AFRICOM, the first military command structure for Africa, just last year, a clear signal that the struggle for the vast resources and undersupplied markets in Africa is just beginning. AFRICOM joins PACOM (war planning for Asia, including the Vietnam War); EUCOM (European war planning... the US segment of NATO); the Southern Command (military planning for interventions in Latin America) and CENTCOM (responsible for military strategy in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and... Iran).

The establishment of AFRICOM in 2007 is undisputable evidence that U.S. policy-makers see Africa as an area of military contention for the foreseeable future. Africa is the last continent, with almost unlimited nature riches, over which all major economies must seek influence to fuel their industrial production.

Before we swallow wholesale the accepted story of "good and evil" among African leaders, a careful study of the politics, history and big-power aims in Africa is probably warranted -- although it is very painful to face up to the machinations of our own military-industrial complex because to do so will require fundamental change within our own society, rather than to look elsewhere for "the problem."

However, as responsible citizens of the most dangerous Empire the world has ever seen...we must.

The future of humanity hangs in the balance, not because of violence committed by local despots, which is, of course, despicable, but because of the political, economic and military manipulations of the post-WWII American Empire which benefits from fueling local conflicts to ensure that its allies (and influence) prevail in every corner of the globe.

However, there has been one good recent development on the International Human Rights "front".

The President of Sudan was indicted for "genocide" and war-crimes by the International Criminal Court even though Sudan has not signed the treaty, which is exactly the same legal position in which the U.S. finds itself because of Bush's rejection of the Clinton's signature on the Treaty of Rome that set up the Court.

When Bush of other American leaders are similarly indicted by the ICC, too, we will be sure that "international justice" is being meted out evenly and the "Rule of the Powerful" will have been replaced by the Rule of Law.

But, as it is now, the powerful decide who among the less-powerful will feel the lash of retribution...or reap the rewards of co-operation.

I realize that the above may be shocking -- and may call my sanity into question in some circles -- but facts are facts, and can re-order our perceptions, if we have the courage to examine them.

Best Regards to All,

Prof. Peter ErlinderWm. Mitchell College of Law, St. Paul, MN
Lead Defence Counsel-UN/ICTR, Arusha, TZ
Past-President, National Lawyers Guild, NY, NY

Published on Tuesday, September 9, 2008 by CommonDreams.org by Peter Erlinder

1 CIA World Factbook, Updated September 4, 2008

2 USA Today, January 8, 2007: "A Christian-led nation...Ethiopia has received nearly $20 million in U.S. military aid since late 2002. That's more than any country in the region except Djibouti...the U.S. and Ethiopian militaries have "a close working relationship," Pentagon spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Joe Carpenter said... [a]dvisers from the Guam national guard have been training Ethiopians in basic infantry skills at two camps in Ethiopia, said Maj. Kelley Thibodeau, a spokeswoman for U.S. forces in Djibouti...There are about 100 U.S. military personnel currently working in Ethiopia, Carpenter said."

3 "Humanitarian crisis in Somalia is worse than Darfur", International Herald Tribune, Nov. 20, 2007. Quoting UN sources.

4 Eritrea: President Accuses U.S. of Genocide in Somalia, http//allafrica.com/stories, Sept. 7, 2008.

5 By 2003, the Congo wars had been going on for 7 years and had killed more than 3 million Congolese. See, UN Panel of Experts Report on the Illegal Exploitation of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, October 20, 2003. Since 1998 to the present, alone, the total is 5.4 million.

6 See, UN Panel of Experts Report on the Illegal Exploitation of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, October 20, 2003.

7 Rptr. Colette Flesch, Report of European Observer Mission, September 2003; See also, Waugh, Paul Kagame and Rwanda: Power, Genocide and the Rwandan Patriotic Front, pp. 185-206 (Mcfarland USA 2004); U.S. State Department 2003 Human Rights Report on Rwanda, Feb. 25, 2004.

8 See, UNAMIR Reconnaisance Report, September 1993; http:Wikipedia.org/wik/list-of-countries-by-number-of-active-troops.

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