"The country's ( Congo) first real election in 40 years is scheduled to take place this summer, and international troops have arrived to keep the peace. But the suffering of Congo's people continues. Fighting persists in the east, where rebel holdouts loot, rape and murder. The Congolese army, which was meant to be both symbol and protector in the reunited country, has cut its own murderous swath, carrying out executions and razing villages. Even deadlier are the side effects of war, the scars left by years of brutality that disfigure Congo's society and infrastructure. The country is plagued by bad sanitation, disease, malnutrition and dislocation. Routine and treatable illnesses have become weapons of mass destruction. Yet Congo's troubles rarely make daily news headlines, and the country is often low on international donors' lists of places to help." from The Deadliest War in the World
- Why were some so committed to ending ethnic cleansing in one part of the world while turning a blind eye to genocide in another?
- Why does the world respond so generously to a natural disaster in one part of the world and have to begged to give to one in another?
- How can a super-power be so committed to over-throwing a tyrant in one part of the world and turn a blind eye to murderous regimes in another part of the world?
- Why did it take so long to bring the need to battle HIV-AIDS to the forefront of the public agenda?
- Why are we just beginning to discuss the tragedies in the Sudan, the Congo, Uganda and Kenya.
- Who decides whose life is worth discussing, caring about, fighting and dying for?
"Congo represents the promise of Africa as much as its misery: its fertile fields and tropical forests cover an area bigger than California, Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Oregon and Texas combined. Its soils are packed with diamonds, gold, copper, tantalum (known locally as coltan and used in electronic devices such as cell phones and laptop computers) and uranium. The waters of its mighty river could one day power the continent. Yet because Congo is so rich in resources, its problems, when left to fester, tend to suck its neighbors into a vortex of exploitation and chaos. And so fixing Congo is essential to fixing Africa. Says Anneke Van Woudenberg, a senior researcher for Human Rights Watch: 'If you want peace in Africa, then you need to deal with the biggest country right at its heart.' " .. a quote from The Deadliest War in the World
"Does this somehow sound familiar? Did the builders of the Titanic design it in such a way that they aimed to kill the occupants of steerage? Not at all. They did, however, design it so that if anyone was going to die, it would be those in steerage. Their deaths were acceptable for the builders of the Titanic. After all, those in steerage were considered a less-relevant population than the rich on the upper decks." a quote from The Titanic of Our Era by Bill Fletcher Jr..
- the need to perpetuate the socio-economic class pyramid. In order for there to be a small group at the top of the pyramid there must be a vast number at the bottom to support it. As the group that was at the bottom group starts to advance up the pyramid, there must be another group at the bottom to replace them ( do the jobs that Americans won't do).
- the love of money and the justification for acquiring and maintaining it by virtually any means necessary. The privileged group must have fuel for their Hummers and enough bling to flaunt no matter the human cost. I'm not Hummers, diamonds or gold. But we all have to ask ourselves -- At What Price?
- the disdain for those that don't have money or the education to know how to capitalize on what they do have. Society often blames the poor for their misfortune. While I believe in personal responsibility, it must be recognized that many people are born into circumstances that stack the odds overwhelmingly against them. See a previous post on this subject.
- the unwillingness of the haves to share with the have nots.
An Excerpt from the Time Magazine June 5th Cover story
Sitting on a bed in a refugee camp in Katanga, a cursed province in the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaïre), Mukeya Ulumba, 28, recounts the epic losses she has suffered in recent months. Several of her relatives and neighbors were killed when antigovernment rebels stormed their village last November, moving from house to house in a murder spree that lasted for hours. Ulumba and her husband managed to flee with their four children, leaving behind their life's possessions, a ravaged community of torched houses and the bloodied corpses of family members and friends. Now Ulumba is struggling to save another life: that of her 6-month-old son Amoni Mutombo. The baby lies whimpering in a clinic run by the aid organization Doctors Without Borders. His belly is distended by malnutrition, and although he appears to be in pain, he has no energy to cry. A nurse tries for half an hour to inject antibiotics into Amoni's twiglike arm, its wrinkled skin wrapped loosely around the bones. Without the drugs, he will die, wasting away from starvation.
Some wars go on killing long after they end. In Congo, a nation of 63 million people in the heart of Africa, a peace deal signed more than three years ago was supposed to halt a war that drew in belligerents from at least eight other countries, producing a record of human devastation unmatched in recent history. The International Rescue Committee (IRC) estimates that 3.9 million people have died from war-related causes since the conflict in Congo began in 1998, making it the world's most lethal conflict since World War II.
By conventional measures, that conflict is over. Congo is no longer the playground of foreign armies. The country's first real election in 40 years is scheduled to take place this summer, and international troops have arrived to keep the peace. But the suffering of Congo's people continues. Fighting persists in the east, where rebel holdouts loot, rape and murder. The Congolese army, which was meant to be both symbol and protector in the reunited country, has cut its own murderous swath, carrying out executions and razing villages. Even deadlier are the side effects of war, the scars left by years of brutality that disfigure Congo's society and infrastructure. The country is plagued by bad sanitation, disease, malnutrition and dislocation. Routine and treatable illnesses have become weapons of mass destruction. According to the IRC, which has conducted a series of detailed mortality surveys over the past six years, 1,250 Congolese still die every day because of war-related causes--the vast majority succumbing to diseases and malnutrition that wouldn't exist in peaceful times. In many respects, the country remains as broken, volatile and dangerous as ever, which is to say, among the very worst places on earth.
Yet Congo's troubles rarely make daily news headlines, and the country is often low on international donors' lists of places to help. After Sudan, Congo is the second largest nation in sub-Saharan Africa, a land so vast and ungovernable that it has long been perceived as the continent's ultimate hellhole, the setting for Joseph Conrad's 1899 book Heart of Darkness. It is in part because of that malign reputation--and because the nation's feckless rulers have consistently reinforced it--that the world has been willing to let Congo bleed. Since 2000, the U.N. has spent billions on its peacekeeping mission in Congo, which is known by its French acronym, MONUC, and it is at the moment the largest U.N. force anywhere in the world. But troops number just 17,500, a tiny presence in such a large country. In February the U.N. and aid groups working in Congo asked for $682 million in humanitarian funds. So far, they have received just $94 million--or $9.40 for every person in need. By comparison, the aid group Oxfam estimates that the U.N.'s tsunami appeal last year raised $550 for each person.
There are various explanations for the neglect. Perhaps the global reservoir of wealth and goodwill runs only so deep. Perhaps the attention and outrage directed toward another African tragedy, the genocide in Darfur, have left the world too exhausted to take on Congo's. But a choice like that comes with a cost. Congo represents the promise of Africa as much as its misery: its fertile fields and tropical forests cover an area bigger than California, Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Oregon and Texas combined. Its soils are packed with diamonds, gold, copper, tantalum (known locally as coltan and used in electronic devices such as cell phones and laptop computers) and uranium. The waters of its mighty river could one day power the continent. Yet because Congo is so rich in resources, its problems, when left to fester, tend to suck its neighbors into a vortex of exploitation and chaos. And so fixing Congo is essential to fixing Africa. Says Anneke Van Woudenberg, a senior researcher for Human Rights Watch: "If you want peace in Africa, then you need to deal with the biggest country right at its heart."
That task is enormous. Over the past year, TIME reporters who visited the worst-hit areas in the east of the country found much of it in ruins. Roads and railway lines have washed away or simply disappeared into the jungle. Hospitals and health clinics have been destroyed. Electricity, for those lucky enough to receive it, is patchy. Refugees fleeing fighting between government troops and rebels talk of beheadings, rapes, massacres and torched villages. Their stories, coming eight years after the start of fighting in Congo, sound eerily similar to the reports of atrocities committed in Darfur. In that sense they are powerful admonishments to those who believe the West's responsibilities in Darfur may have been lifted with the signing of a peace agreement in early May: Congo's warring parties too say they are abiding by a peace deal, monitored by U.N. troops. But the dying continues. Congo provides tragic proof that in some places peace and war can look a lot alike.
