Kagame responds to Ramaphosa over DRC crisis

CAPTION: Rwanda army shows off new military hardware recently. (Courtesy photo).
By Our reporter
KIGALI – President Paul Kagame has debunked claims made by South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and clarified points discussed during conversations between them over the situation in eastern DR Congo.
Following conversations held virtually by the two Heads of State on two occasions, Ramaphosa and other South African officials made statements which Kagame said contained a lot of distortion, deliberate attacks, and even lies.
The duo held talks following the fall of Goma, the capital of North Kivu Province of DR Congo, to the M23 rebel group, a Congolese outfit.
“If words can change so much from a conversation to a public statement, it says a lot about how these very important issues are being managed,” Kagame said.
“The Rwanda Defence Force is an army, not a militia,” Kagame said in response to his counterpart’s statement that the fighting in eastern DR Congo “is the result of an escalation by the rebel group M23 and Rwanda Defence Force (RDF) militia engaging the Armed Forces of the DRC (FARDC) and attacking peacekeepers from the SADC Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (SAMIDRC).”
Something that Kagame clarified noting that SAMIDRC is not a peacekeeping force which has no place in this situation, instead, it was authorized by SADC as a belligerent force engaging in offensive combat operations to help the Congolese government fight against its own people, working alongside genocidal armed groups like FDLR which target Rwanda, while also threatening to take the war to Rwanda itself.
On several occasions, He emphasized that Rwanda will never fail to protect its sovereignty and people, knowing very well the price of security and peace.
“SAMIDRC displaced a true peacekeeping force, the East African Community Regional Force, and this contributed to the failure of the negotiation processes.”