Goma Situation Report for December 14, 2007

UNCLAS KINSHASA 001369 SIPDIS SIPDIS SENSITIVE E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PGOV KDEM PHUM MOPS PREL PREF KPKO CG SUBJECT: Goma Situation Report for December 14, 2007 SENSTIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED - PROTECT ACCORDINGLY Note: The following report was provided by Embassy Kinshasa's political officer in Goma. End note. Goma Report December 14, 2007 ¶1. (SBU) Summary: Fallout from the army's reversal continues apace. FARDC held its position on the Rutshuru axis December 13 but the region's deputy commander was reportedly shot in the shoulder by his own men. General Narayan estimates 5,000 deserters, of whom some are in Goma where they could cause trouble. First estimates of numbers of IDP's appear exaggerated. End Summary. ¶2. (SBU) MONUC North Kivu Brigade Commander General Narayan briefed Special Envoy Tim Shortley December 14 before he departed by MONUC convoy to Kirolirwe (helicopter connection countermanded by rain). Narayan recounted the history of the general collapse of the FARDC offensive December 10-11. He estimated that the number of FARDC deserters (i.e., fleeing soldiers) was 5,000. He had reports (denied by FARDC 8th region commander Mayala) that Mayala's deputy Colonel Delphin had been shot in the shoulder December 13 and eight of his bodyguards killed in an altercation with his own soldiers at Sake. At Katale (road to Masisi),MONUC had urged the FARDC commander there to return to Katale after fleeing in panic to Masisi, so far without success. Narayan said that there was heavy shelling at Rugari December 13, but the local MONUC commander persuaded the FARDC battalion commander to hold his ground, and the threat at Rugari appeared to have subsided December 14. Narayan continued to emphasize the leadership deficit in the FARDC, lamenting that MONUC had had to save Sake now three times, November 2006, August 2007, and now. ¶3. (SBU) MONUC political briefer told Goma poloff and USAIDoff that 400 fleeing, armed FARDC soldiers were thought to be in the "Mount Goma" section of Goma. MONUC would be monitoring the area carefully. FARDC had sent a shipment of ammunition to Nyanzale, but MONUC had no information to suggest FARDC was planning any (necessarily ill-advised) military offensive in that quarter. MONUC learned that French television journalists had participated in unearthing mass graves discovered some months ago north of Rutshuru. ¶4. (SBU) OCHA reports that new IDP's moving into the IDP camps between Sake and Goma number approximately 6,000, a figure far less than original estimates ranging from 20,000 to 60,000. The number of IDP's coming from Rugari to Kibumba (on the Congo-Nile divide on the Rutshuru axis) in the past two days may have reached a similar magnitude. Garvelink