VZCZCXRO7928
OO RUEHBZ RUEHDU RUEHGI RUEHJO RUEHMR RUEHRN
DE RUEHKI #0778/01 2660633
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
O 220633Z SEP 08
FM AMEMBASSY KINSHASA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 8456
INFO RUEHXR/RWANDA COLLECTIVE
RUCNSAD/SOUTHERN AF DEVELOPMENT COMMUNITY COLLECTIVE
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHDC
RHEFDIA/DIA WASHDC
RHMFISS/HQ USEUCOM VAIHINGEN GE
RUZEJAA/JAC MOLESWORTH RAF MOLESWORTH UK

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 KINSHASA 000778 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL MOPS KPKO PHUM PREF CG
SUBJECT:    Goma Report September 19:  Masisi Fighting 
 
¶1.  (SBU) Summary:  MONUC helicopters fired on CNDP four miles south 
of Masisi, forestalling a possible CNDP move on Masisi or Katale. 
Minister of Defense warned the facilitation team that it had only 
two more days to get Nkunda's agreement to the disengagement plan 
and then use of force ("contraindre") would be necessary.  End 
Summary. 
 
¶2.  (SBU) CNDP official Muiti called poloff mid-morning September 19 
to say that FARDC, PARECO, and FDLR were continuing to attack CNDP 
from the west (from the direction of Masisi and 81st brigade 
headquarters at Katale).  He described President Kabila's statements 
to the press the previous day as a "declaration of war."  He 
repeated CNDP's insistence on direct talks with the government in 
Addis Ababa or Nairobi and CNDP's refusal to meet either at Kimoka 
or Goma air terminal, whatever security assurances MONUC might give. 
 CNDP did not, he said, trust MONUC. 
 
¶3.  (SBU) North Kivu brigade commander Brigadier General Rawat told 
facilitation members late afternoon September 19 that fighting over 
the past 36 hours had shifted to the Masisi area.  North Kivu 
brigade had detected several columns of CNDP, from 20 to 60 men, 
moving out of CNDP territory both north and south of Masisi and 
Katale.  There have been skirmishes between CNDP and PARECO.  On 
September 18, North Kivu brigade had already detected a camp of CNDP 
troops four miles south of Masisi, well west of CNDP territory, and 
had warned them to leave the area.  Two MONUC attack helicopters 
were dispatched in the morning September 19 and fired warning shots 
at the camp.  The helicopters then returned to the camp, ascertained 
that the CNDP troops had not departed, and fired ten rockets, with 
six of the rockets hitting the CNDP camp.  The CNDP troops 
immediately withdrew.  (Note:  FARDC also sent in two attack 
helicopters, which also fired shots, but ineffectively at too far 
distance.  Reports that a FARDC helicopter was shot down are 
inaccurate.  End note.)  Rawat regretted having to use the attack 
helicopters, but his assessment was that CNDP was attempting a move 
against Masisi and Katale.  He said that the South African 
contingent present in Masisi town was under pressure from the 15,000 
IDPs who gathered around the contingent and had begun to throw 
rocks, out of fear of a CNDP attack and because the contingent had 
run out of food to hand out. 
 
¶4.  (SBU) Midday September 19, Minister of Defense Chikez (who has 
been in North Kivu for two weeks) called a meeting of MONUC and the 
facilitation team.  Amani National Coordinator Malu Malu, Joint 
Technical Chairman Etumba, "Operations Commander" General Lukama, 
and North Kivu Governor Paluku were present.  There was much 
discussion of the disengagement plan which, Chikez said, the 
government embraced with its "whole heart."  But his main purpose 
was to convey to the facilitation team that it was the latter's 
responsibility to get Nkunda on board with the plan, that it had 
only two more days to accomplish that essential goal (according to 
the plan's calendar), and that if that were not accomplished, then 
MONUC would have to move quickly from a persuasive ("convaincre") 
posture to a compelling ("contraindre") posture against CNDP. 
(Note:  "Contraindre" means use of force or a believable threat of 
use of force.)  Malu Malu said that, in a telephone conversation he 
had just had with SRSG Doss, Doss had assured him that MONUC would 
"do everything necessary" to use force against CNDP in Masisi. 
Chikez and Etumba asserted that CNDP had launched an offensive in 
Masisi, and Malu Malu said that CNDP had made multiple attacks on 
PARECO. 
 
¶5.  (SBU) Deputy Chief of Staff Colonel Cunliffe, after giving a 
review of the disengagement plan, related that there had been 
persistent exchanges of fire in the environs of Masisi and Katale. 
The North Kivu brigade, he said, had sent out patrols who, in one 
area (Kahengole), had observed FDLR and PARECO operating together in 
the early hours of the morning, with FARDC not far away.  This 
statement (implication of FARDC complicity with FDLR) incurred a 
barrage of outrage from Chikez, Etumba, and the governor of North 
Kivu, who condemned Cunliffe personally and threatened to have him 
thrown out of the country.  (Note:  Twenty minutes was consumed by 
this kind of vituperation; fortunately, Col. Cunliffe has little 
French and no one on the facilitation side cared to translate the 
increasingly abusive language that the Minister and Etumba heaped on 
him.  End note.)  Etumba also objected to what he described as an 
incident of North Kivu brigade's firing on FARDC. 
 
¶6.  (SBU) Minister Chikez reiterated that on Day D plus 3 there 
would be an "evaluation" of the international facilitation, and that 
if CNDP had not agreed to comply with the disengagement plan, the 
Minister implied, there would be dire (but unspecified) 
consequences.  (Note:  Earlier in the day, a member of the Amani 
hierarchy who has  regular contact with CNDP said that senior 
Kinshasa officials presently in Goma, including Minister Chikez, 
have been in contact with civil-society leaders about organizing 
 
KINSHASA 00000778  002 OF 002 
 
 
anti-MONUC and possibly anti-Facilitation demonstrations.  An 
expatriate who has close ties to CNDP, in a subsequent conversation, 
told us that the CNDP operations to which MONUC responded were not 
in fact directed against FARDC but were responses to PARECO/FDLR 
moves toward CNDP territory.  The expatriate said that unless MONUC 
is even-handed with respect not only to FARDC vs. CNDP, but also 
PARECO and its FDLR allies, there was little chance that CNDP would 
respond to efforts to get it back into a cease-fire process.  End 
Note.) 
 
¶7.  (SBU) Minister Chikez further announced that he was prepared, at 
SRSG Doss's request, to issue a statement reaffirming the 
government's commitment to the January cease-fire and its urgent 
demand that all armed groups adhere to it.  The drafting of this 
statement (presumably now issued to the press) was done on the basis 
of Etumba's hand-written notes, transcribed by a French MONUC 
officer sitting at a computer and trying to keep up with drafting 
suggestions coming from all sides. 
 
¶8.  (SBU) Eastern Coordinator Alpha Sow afterward told poloff that 
the government (through Tutsi businessmen Emmanuel Kamanzi and 
Bizima Karaha) and MONUC had thus far failed to reach Nkunda or 
persuade CNDP to agree to a meeting to discuss the disengagement 
plan.  MONUC Force Commander General Gaye is due back in Goma 
September 20, and one of his objectives is to try to meet Nkunda to 
present the MONUC disengagement plan.  As of September 19 at 19:00, 
no contact with the CNDP leadership has been established, and there 
is no realistic prospect that there will be anyone available on the 
CNDP side for General Gaye (whom CNDP has been attacking in its 
website, referring to a French arrest warrant against him). 
 
GARVELINK