Congolese forces put down attempted coup

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Monday, March 29, 2004

Congolese forces put down attempted coup

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Congolese Government forces put down an apparent coup attempt in Kinshasa, the Congolese capital, on Sunday, battling attackers believed loyal to deceased former dictator Mobutu Sese Seko. It was the most serious political strife to hit the city since the end of Congo's ruinous 5-year war.

The government refused to characterize the deadly firefights as an attempted putsch, but Interior Minister Theophile Mbemba said the attack would not destabilize President Joseph Kabila's government a national-unity administration struggling to reassert control over its vast, rebellion-splintered territory after a 1998-2003 war.

"We have the situation under control," government spokesman Vital Kamerhe said.

Fighters loyal to Mobutu, Congo's late Cold War dictator, were among those who launched Sunday's "coup attempt," British Ambassador Jim Atkinson told The Associated Press.

Mobutu was overthrown in 1997 by then-ruler Laurent Kabila, Joseph's father. As Kabila's insurgents entered Kinshasa, thousands of Mobutu loyalists scattered and now live in surrounding countries.

The attacks began before dawn and lasted through four hours of gunfire that kept most Kinshasa citizens indoors. Hundreds of Congolese took to the streets to cheer government troops as the shooting eased in early afternoon when the government apparently overcame the attackers.

Kabila was believed in the country Sunday but where was not known.

"I have it on good authority that he's safe," Atkinson said.

Congolese officials said the simultaneous pre-dawn attacks targeted an army camp near Kabila's offices, a military airport, a naval shipyard on the Congo river and the national radio and television headquarters.

Congolese forces apprehended 12 assailants, Kamerhe said adding that untold numbers of the attackers who wore no uniforms disappeared into the city with their weapons. He said the battle killed one soldier and wounded two others.

One injured assailant fled into a U.N. building in Kinshasa, but was later turned over to Congolese authorities, said Hamadoun Toure, a U.N. spokesman.

The assault represents the first major threat to the power-sharing government meant to reunify and stabilize Congo after a devastating five-year civil war in which an estimated 3 million people died, mainly through war-induced hunger and disease.

Kinshasa was spared the worst of the fighting in the war and Sunday's attacks represent the most-serious political violence to hit the city since rebels traveled from their bush headquarters to the city to join Kabila's government last year.

After the fighting, authorities seized six rocket-propelled grenades, two mortar tubes, 30 grenades, 75 AK-47 assault rifles and thousands of rounds of ammunition, the army said.

Congo officials said the government of national unity would continue its mission to move Congo beyond its ruinous war, which saw foreign-backed rebels take control of the east and much of the north.

"This event will not destabilize the government. Everybody's still working together," Mbemba told reporters.

Thousands of soldiers loyal to Mobutu's government fled across the Congo River to Brazzaville, capital of neighboring Republic of Congo, after the ex-leader was ousted in 1997.

Many of the ex-Mobutu loyalists are disgruntled over their virtual exclusion from Congo's peace deal preventing them from sharing in proceeds from the rich diamond and gold mines and lush forests of a country the size of Western Europe.

Source: agencies

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