Kagame accuses Burundi of deploying troops to DRC

Rwanda’s President, Paul Kagame, has accused Burundi of sending troops to fight alongside militia groups in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo), as he denies accusations of sending his own soldiers.

Over the last few days, the conflict in South Kivu province, which borders Rwanda and Burundi in eastern DR Congo, has escalated, displacing tens of thousands of locals.

Local groups on the ground and international non-governmental organisations have accused both Rwanda and Burundi of sending troops to the region to fight alongside warring factions.

President Kagame held a video press conference with journalists on Monday, in which he said observers on the ground “don’t look at what is happening there, but want to see Rwandan army presence.

“Our intelligence tells us [that] we have forces from Burundi, government forces, operating in that region.

“There is not a single soldier of Rwandan Defence Force that has gone to that territory… [and] the government of DRC knows the fact that not a single soldier of RDF is there”, the president said.

But Burundi’s presidential spokesperson, Jean Claude Karerwa, rebuffed President Kagame’s claims, telling reporters that “Unless requested by AU or UN, Burundi can’t deploy troops to another country”.

The east African neighbours fell out in May 2015 when a attempted coup against President Pierre Nkurunziza of Burundi failed, amid claims that some of the plotters fled to Rwanda.

[Photo: Getty Images]