Collusion with Killers

By ANDREW PURVIS/GOMA

One recent morning, a neatly typed letter arrived at the offices of CARE in Goma, Zaire, addressed to relief worker Guy Banville and signed by "the refugees of Katale." Katale is a huge Rwandan refugee settlement in a valley north of Goma where the 36-year-old Canadian had been supervising food deliveries for nearly three months. "Frankly," the letter began in French, "it seems to us that you are tired of living." It concluded with a chilling ultimatum: "You must leave the region within 48 hours -- if you value your life. Thank you and bon voyage."

Banville left on the next plane, and CARE evacuated its entire foreign staff from Katale shortly thereafter. The letter, it turned out, had not been sent by ordinary aid recipients but by their self-appointed leaders, former members of Rwanda's extremist Hutu government that orchestrated the death of more than 500,000 Tutsi and moderate Hutu. It was only the latest in a series of increasingly dire threats by these leaders aimed at eliminating outside interference in the camps and tightening their control of food distributions. The power play has presented those responsible for the relief effort with a dilemma: Should they cease their humanitarian work and put at risk the lives of innocent refugees, or accept the fact that they must hand over millions of dollars in supplies to the perpetrators of Rwanda's recent holocaust, who hope to use the camps as headquarters for rekindling a bloody civil war?

"Normally," explains Dr. Alain Destexhe, the secretary-general of Medecins Sans Frontieres, "refugees are people who are persecuted. But here we are dealing with people responsible for genocide. We should recognize that, and we should not be strengthening these leaders."

At first there was little choice. While thousands died daily of cholera, the question of who controlled aid distributions seemed of little consequence. But as the emergency in the camps in Zaire and Tanzania abated, it became clear that Rwanda's former government was re-creating a replica of its defeated regime, from former ministers down to the tiniest cell leader of a few hundred peasants. Despite efforts by foreign overseers like Banville, each day for the past three months, aid workers have been handing over food, medicine and other supplies to these erstwhile officials.

Francois Karera was the prefect of Greater Kigali, a man whose incitement of the militia that butchered hundreds of thousands of Tutsi makes him one of Rwanda's most notorious war criminals. He now calls himself director of food distribution for the Rwandan Refugee Social Affairs Committee. "The population," he says, "has to be with their government. We are here to protect them from infiltrators. We are their family."

If the refugees are Karera's family, they are in trouble. A recent survey by aid workers in Goma found that food distribution was badly skewed. Former soldiers, officials and militiamen are living well, hoarding donated food and blankets and selling these supplies at high prices. At the same time, nearly half the camp population -- notably the elderly, women and children -- are not getting enough food to ward off malnutrition.

Attempts to bypass the former officials have met with failure or worse. Shortly before Banville was forced to leave, several dozen Rwandan Boy Scouts who had been assigned by aid agencies to provide security at the Katale camp ! were attacked by militiamen wielding clubs and machetes; at least 18 of the youngsters are missing and presumed dead.

By intimidating their people and limiting outside influences, the Hutu leaders are intent on keeping as many Rwandans as possible from returning to their native country in order to strengthen their bargaining position with the new government in Kigali. If talks fail, control of the camps will provide another alternative. "We will attack, it is clear," says Karera. Gesturing toward a crowd gathered at a food-distribution center in Katale, he adds with a smile, "Do you really think this situation can last?" Foreign observers in Goma agree. "This is a classic environment for guerrilla incursions," says Captain Declan O'Brien, an Irish army logistics specialist seconded to the aid agency GOAL. "You can't have 30,000 soldiers just sitting here twiddling their thumbs."

Major General Augustin Bizimungu, the commander of the defeated Hutu army, is only slightly more circumspect. "People call me a killer of innocents," he says. "But I represent the Rwandan people. ((Defense Minister and former rebel commander)) Paul Kagame must negotiate with us. If he does not, he may have trouble sleeping at night for fear that I will come to bother him."

Bizimungu knows time is on his side as long as food donations keep pouring in. Though individual agencies may continue to withdraw, aid workers note that short of stopping relief altogether, their hands are tied. Many recall Cambodia in the late 1970s, when foreign food assistance to refugees on the Thai border enabled the defeated Khmer Rouge to live and fight another day. Rwandans who have already suffered a holocaust now face a choice between starvation or the resumption of war.