Dutch call for new look at nationality

The Netherlands Ambassador to the UN, Peter Van Walsum, who was a member of the recent UN Security Council fact-finding mission to the DRC, has called for the DRC government to take a fresh look at the issue of nationality in the context of the inter-Congolese dialogue. Van Walsum, addressing the Council after the mission presented its findings last week, said that while there tended to be a sharp focus on military issues, the success of the dialogue was another condition for preserving the DRC’s territorial integrity.

“Stripping ethnic groups of their nationality on account of their kinship with an ethnic group in a neighbouring country could not be reconciled with the African doctrine of inviolate borders,” he added. The national sovereign conference (CNS) of 1992 denied Zairean nationality to the Banyamulenge, and the persecution felt by Congolese Tutsis in eastern DRC - viewed by many indigenous groups as “foreigners” - ignited the 1996 war and, to a lesser extent, the current conflict, he said.