“Intensive” fighting in Kisangani

Heavy fighting between Rwandan and Ugandan soldiers broke out in the town of Kisangani on Friday morning, with a provisional casualty toll of five dead and nine injured. Lieutenant-Colonel Akram Hossain, who heads the UN monitoring team in Kisangani, confirmed to IRIN the Ugandan army began shelling Rwandan and rebel RCD positions at 0400 on Friday morning. The fighting was still continuing and at times was very intensive with mortars and rocket launchers being used, he said. He feared the fighting, which was concentrated around the main airport and Kisangani outskirts, would move into the town centre. A senior Ugandan intelligence officer acknowledged to IRIN there had been some fighting, but blamed the Rwandans for ambushing Ugandan troops at the Banalia bridge. Rwanda, for its part, urged regional intervention to put a stop to the fighting. “We have informed the Tanzanian and South African authorities about the situation in Kisangani, so that they intervene and end this unfortunate development,” Major Emmanuel Ndahiro, the Rwandan army spokesman, told IRIN.

The fighting comes at a time when Rwandan President Paul Kagame was planning a state visit to Uganda next week to try and improve relations between the two formerly close allies. “Maybe the people who started this are not interested in the normalisation of relations between the two countries,” Ndahiro commented. Tension has been steadily mounting in Kisangani over the past few weeks. Fighting in the city last year between Rwandan and Ugandan troops left hundreds of people dead. [For more information, see separate IRIN stories issued Friday on the Kisangani fighting].