Militia group agrees to canton its forces outside Bunia by Tuesday

The Union des patriotes congolais (UPC) has agreed to canton its forces outside Bunia, the main town of Ituri District in northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), by 11:00 (8:00 GMT) on Tuesday, the Hema militia group reported. The announcement on Sunday followed a meeting in Bunia the previous day between a UPC delegation, headed by its president, Thomas Lubanga, and the UN-mandated multinational force, headed by Gen Jean-Paul Thonier of France. Representatives from the UN Mission in the DRC, MONUC, were also present. "Only the international force is authorised to assure security in the city of Bunia and to carry out patrols from Tuesday 24 June 2003 at 11h00," said the UPC statement, signed by spokesman Mathieu Amboko Bebetu. "The forces of the UPC must be cantoned at sites outside the city to continue to assure the security of the population in the interior of the Ituri region," he said. The UPC said it would maintain its headquarters in Bunia, although it would inform the multinational force of the locations and number of personnel assigned to each. Furthermore, the UPC said it had agreed to cooperate with the multinational force in the formation of a committee to discuss creation of a force capable of assuring the security of the population, "a sort of police force". Regarding the Ituri Pacification Commission (IPC), the political body recognised by the UN Security Council as the sole legitimate authority in the Ituri region, the UPC said it would hold meetings with the body "to harmonise future actions regarding the management of Ituri", and that it would allow the IPC to broadcast communiques over the UPC-controlled Radio Candip. On Sunday, the French-led multinational force exchanged fire with gunmen in Bunia and were targeted by a hand grenade that failed to explode, French news agency AFP reported. It quoted the force's spokesman, Col Gerard Dubois, as saying that the force had sent a patrol to the southwestern suburb of Tchemtchem after residents reported that armed men were looting a nearby dispensary. "The militiamen attacked the patrol, which responded," Dubois told AFP, adding that the exchange of fire was very brief. "The militiamen then fled, throwing a grenade which did not explode," he said. He added that no casualties were sustained on either side during the incident. This was the third time the multinational force had engaged armed men in Bunia. Meanwhile, both the multinational force and MONUC expressed their discontent with the arrival in Bunia on Friday of about 110 police officers sent by Kinshasa. French news agency AFP quoted Dubois as saying: "It is important that the police officers, who arrived yesterday, leave. There should not be any police reinforcement on the ground, it is in contradiction with the agreements." For its part, MONUC said the deployment, decided without previous consultation, would "hamper the demilitarisation process in Bunia and the cantonment of armed groups under the Ituri Pacification Commission's resolution [and] confirmed by the parties signatory to the Dar es Salaam Act of Engagement last 16 May". MONUC said this was the second unilateral police deployment in Bunia initiated by the DRC government, the first having taken place in early May. During a recent visit to Kinshasa, a UN Security Council mission called for the withdrawal of the 301 Congolese officers previously deployed to Bunia, MONUC reported.