[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 54 (Wednesday, April 30, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Page S3858]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           AVOID FURTHER BLOODSHED, NEGOTIATE PEACE IN ZAIRE

 Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, Zaire must seize the current moment 
to avoid further bloodshed and negotiate a peaceful resolution to its 
current crisis. A tentative agreement for a meeting on Friday between 
President Mobutu Sese Seko and rebel Alliance leader Laurent Kabila has 
been reached. This meeting is critical to avoid further loss of human 
life in Zaire. I applaud Ambassador Richardson's presence in Zaire and 
fully support his important and courageous efforts to facilitate a 
peaceful settlement to the current political turmoil.
  The current crisis in Zaire has reached a critical fork in the road. 
In one direction lies the peaceful path of democracy and economic 
reform. In the other, the well-worn road of violence, bloodshed, and 
political instability. President Mobutu Sese Seko and rebel Alliance 
leader Laurent Kabila at this moment hold the fate of their country in 
their hands.
  I strongly encourage President Mobutu and Mr. Kabila to earnestly 
engage in a critical dialog on the future of Zaire. I urge them to put 
the interests of Zaire and their countrymen first, and resolve the 
current political crisis without further unnecessary loss of life.
  I have been deeply troubled by recent reports of wide-spread human 
rights abuses and mass killings of refugees and displaced persons in 
rebel-controlled Zaire. There are numerous accounts of desperately ill 
and malnourished women and children being indiscriminately slaughtered 
and maimed.
  Recently 55,000 refugees have inexplicably disappeared from a refugee 
camp outside Kisangani. Of these refugees, some 9,000, including 2,500 
severely malnourished children, had only days earlier been deemed 
medically unfit to travel by visiting relief workers.
  After a week of repeatedly denying the United Nations to care for and 
repatriate refugees in rebel-controlled territory, today's news reports 
indicate the rebel Alliance is once again allowing the United Nations 
to care for the sick and the dying. Refusal to have given access to the 
United Nations over the past week, resulting in the maltreatment of 
refugees and displaced persons has been nothing short of deplorable.
  I call upon Mr. Kabila to put a permanent end to the bloodletting of 
innocents in Eastern Zaire. All impediments to humanitarian relief 
efforts in Zaire must be permanently removed.
  The United Nations must be permitted continued full access to these 
refugees and allowed to repatriate them to Rwanda without interference. 
Furthermore, the slaughter of those refugees suspected of 
responsibility for the 1994 Rwandan genocide must cease, as it is 
neither justifiable nor defensible. These people must be returned to 
Rwanda where they can stand trial in an appropriate court of law and 
rightly be held accountable for their crimes.
  It is time for President Mobutu and Mr. Kabila to signal their 
willingness to set Zaire on the path to peace and democracy. Zaire is a 
country of enormous potential that has suffered untold tragedies. 
Failure to seize this critical opportunity to negotiate peace in Zaire 
will only set that country woefully back.
  The fighting in Zaire must stop. The crisis in the country cannot be 
resolved by force. Replacement of the Mobutu regime with yet another 
authoritarian regime is a recipe of further political instability. I 
strongly urge both President Mobutu and Mr. Kabila to seize the current 
opportunity to avoid further bloodshed and choose the constructive path 
of peace and democracy in Zaire.

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