People running for their lives in the east

While the situation in the eastern Congolese town of Goma appears calm and relatively stable, the story in the surrounding forests and remote villages is completely different with people literally running for their lives. According to humanitarian workers who recently visited these areas and spoke to local residents, the Rwandan Interahamwe militia is carrying out a “massive campaign of intimidation”. Villagers said they were so afraid that they went to sleep in the forests at night when most of the attacks usually take place. In Goma hospital, 26 of 27 patients in the orthopaedics ward had received bullet wounds sustained in Interahamwe attacks. “The pressure in the villages is so great that people can’t live their lives,” Nigel Marsh of the NGO, World Vision, told IRIN. Villagers, victims of both sides in the DRC conflict, also spoke of reprisal attacks carried out by soldiers of the governing Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie (RCD-Goma). Marsh underlined the huge number of displaced people in eastern DRC. “A massive amount of work still needs to be done,” he stressed. “The donors should not stop giving to Congo as we have to keep these people alive.” He said the situation was particularly bad in Kirotshe, near Goma, where World Vision is providing therapeutic feeding for about 200 malnourished people at any one time. Most of the patients at the small hospital are victims of Interahamwe attacks, either directly, or suffering the consequences of hiding out in the forests for long periods. Marsh warned that the patients at Kirotshe were just the tip of the iceberg. Hundreds of thousands more people were still believed to be in the forests with no help at all. The new leader of the RCD, Adolphe Onusumba - himself a medical doctor - has pledged to engage his administration in the care of victims. Speaking after a visit to Goma hospital, he gave humanitarian agencies an assurance of support, World Vision said. “These are difficult days for the people,” Onusumba remarked. “We need medical specialists, drugs, food, everything. But most of all we need peace.”