The village of Gatumba lies on the western side of

Burundi Burundi, officially the Republic of Burundi, is a landlocked country in East Africa. It is located in the Great Rift Valley at the junction between the African Great Lakes region and Southeast Africa, with a population of over 14 million peop ...

, near the border with the

Democratic Republic of the Congo The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), also known as the DR Congo, Congo-Kinshasa, or simply the Congo (the last ambiguously also referring to the neighbouring Republic of the Congo), is a country in Central Africa. By land area, it is t ...

. The place is known for a massacre that took place at Gatumba refugee camp connected to the village.

Massacre

On August 13, 2004, a refugee camp in Gatumba was the scene of one of the largest civilian

massacres A massacre is an event of killing people who are not engaged in hostilities or are defenseless. It is generally used to describe a targeted killing of civilians en masse by an armed group or person. The word is a loan of a French term for "b ...

carried out in Burundi in recent years. A force of armed combatants, many of them members of the Forces for National Liberation (FNL), massacred at least 166

Congolese Congolese or Kongolese may refer to: African peoples * Congolese people (disambiguation) * Kongo people, a Bantu ethnic group who live along the Atlantic coast of Africa from Pointe-Noire (Republic of Congo) to Luanda, Angola, primarily defined by ...

civilians and wounded another 106. The FNL is a predominantly

Hutu The Hutu (), also known as the Abahutu, are a Bantu ethnic group native to the African Great Lakes region. They mainly live in Rwanda, Burundi, and Uganda where they form one of the principal ethnic groups alongside the Tutsi and the Great L ...

rebel movement known for its hostility to

Tutsi The Tutsi ( ), also called Watusi, Watutsi or Abatutsi (), are an ethnic group of the African Great Lakes region. They are a Bantu languages, Bantu-speaking ethnic group and the second largest of three main ethnic groups in Rwanda and Burundi ( ...

and the victims were largely

Banyamulenge The Banyamulenge are a community that lives mainly in South Kivu Province, Democratic Republic of the Congo, with roots from mainly Rwanda. The Banyamulenge are culturally and socially related to the Banyarwanda Tutsi found in Rwanda, with mos ...

, a group often categorized with

. The FNL is believed to have been behind a series of other attacks, including the December 28, 2000

Titanic Express massacre The Titanic Express massacre took place on 28 December 2000, when 21 people were killed in an attack on a ''Titanic Express'' bus close to Bujumbura (then the capital of Burundi). The passengers, who had traveled from Kigali in Rwanda Rw ...

. Brigadier-General Germain Niyoyankana, head of the Burundian army, accused Congolese troops of complicity in the killings. Following the FNL's admission of responsibility for the Gatumba massacre, the Burundian government issued arrest warrants for the group's leader,

Agathon Rwasa Agathon Rwasa (born 10 January 1964) is a Burundian politician and the leader of the National Liberation Forces (''Forces pour la Libération Nationale'', FNL). He was a Hutu militia leader during the Burundi Civil War. Rwasa was reported to be ...

, and declared its intention to refer the matter to the

International Criminal Court The International Criminal Court (ICC) is an intergovernmental organization and International court, international tribunal seated in The Hague, Netherlands. It is the first and only permanent international court with jurisdiction to prosecute ...

. The

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...

issued a resolution condemning the attack, and the

African Union The African Union (AU) is a continental union of 55 member states located on the continent of Africa. The AU was announced in the Sirte Declaration in Sirte, Libya, on 9 September 1999, calling for the establishment of the African Union. The b ...

declared the FNL a terrorist organisation. No arrests have yet been made.

FNL statement

In October 2005, the FNL issued a statement condemning the Gatumba massacre, denouncing Agathon Rwasa for leading a "descent into hell", and announcing that he had been replaced. Rwasa was reported to have fled to Tanzania.

External links

BBC report on GatumbaHuman Rights Watch report on GatumbaUN Resolution 1602, reiterating condemnation of Gatumba massacre

References

2004 in Burundi Massacres in Burundi Populated places in Burundi {{Burundi-geo-stub