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The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in the capital, Kinshasa, launched an appeal on Wednesday for the respect and support of humanitarian workers in northeastern regions of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
The call comes in the wake of the expulsion of the OCHA representative to Ituri, Felix Ntumba, and his declaration as persona non grata by the Union des patriotes congolais rebel authorities that control Bunia.
OCHA said the current situation in Ituri was illustrative of the depth of the humanitarian crises plaguing the DRC, with an estimated 500,000 people in the northeastern region alone uprooted, displaced, and continually fleeing a situation of "absolute insecurity".
"These civilians know they are being used as pawns among armed groups who have never shown respect toward them, in a strategy of terror and reciprocated horrors," OCHA said. "Massive movements of populations living in perpetual fear have been the result."
OCHA reported that among all the regions of the DRC, Ituri had been the subject of the most widespread efforts to disseminate information regarding basic humanitarian principles of impartiality, neutrality, and independence, in the Kihema, Kilendu, Kiswahili, Lingala, French and English languages.
"However, these universally accepted principles are not respected in the regions of Ituri and Uele, and in North Kivu [Province], where a multitude of armed factions are fighting," OCHA said.
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