Journalists detained after controversial interview

Two reporters have been detained by the DRC authorities after an interview with the DRC ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Antoine Gabriel Kyungu, in which he criticised the way the country was being governed. Kyungu himself has also been arrested. The media watchdog, International Freedom of Expression Community (IFEX), said the two journalists, Jean-Rene Mputu Biduaya and Jean-Rene Lumbana Kapasa from the private television stations RAGA and Radiotelevision Kin Malebo (RTKM) respectively, were detained on
Friday and ordered not to leave Kinshasa until the completion of an inquiry into the interview. Kyungu, formerly DRC ambassador to Kenya, reportedly said the Congolese people had lost faith in President Laurent-Desire Kabila.

Kyungu, a controversial character, was governor of Katanga province in 1993 when he proclaimed its autonomy and launched a wave of ethnic pogroms against the Kasai Luba (Baluba) people that resulted in hundreds of deaths and thousands of expulsions. As a result, some 10,000 Kasai immigrants to Shaba (or Katanga), most of whom had been brought in to work in the mines,
were forced back into the Kasai region. He was suspended as governor in 1995, following accusations that he was importing arms in a new bid for secession, but was appointed ambassador to Kenya in late 1998.