Sixty-eight United Nations (UN) staff and their dependants were on Wednesday afternoon airlifted from Kigali International Airport by a UN aircraft and were believed to be headed to Entebbe in Uganda from where they would be flown to the Congolese capital Kinshasa. The group is part of a larger batch of close to 2000 UN staff, and humanitarian workers who are mainly employed at the UN Goma-based quarters, the eastern DR Congo city which was captured by M23 rebels. The group arrived in Rwanda on Monday, January 27, in the wake of intensified fighting between the AFC/M23 rebels and the Congolese government forces (FARDC) and its coalition which culminated into the rebels capturing Goma, the capital of North Kivu Province. ALSO READ: UN commends Rwanda for heeding 'last minute call' to relocate Goma-based staff Buses transported the group from Rubavu to Kigali Pele Stadium, where they were screened and processed. Arrangements of accommodation proceeded with the Rwandan government availing 38 hotels and apartments. Speaking to The New Times, the United Nations (UN) Resident Coordinator to Rwanda, Ozonnia Ojielo, said in an earlier interview that the batch would be facilitated back to DR Congo “in a gradual phase.” He pointed out that a significant number of the group had pre-existing medical conditions, including pregnant mothers, young children as well as “men in clutches”. “So the first thing for me to say is that the United Nations System, the Country Team in Rwanda, is deeply grateful to the government of Rwanda and its institutions for the rapidity of the decision because things like that are matters of life and death.” “But the expansiveness of the presence of Rwandan authorities is extremely impressive. There was no Government of Rwanda institution that was needed and that was not present there,” Ojielo said in an exclusive interview on Tuesday, January 28. The M23 rebels, who have been fighting the Congolese army since late 2021, dealt huge blows to the government and its coalition last week, with the killing of North Kivu Province’s Military Governor Peter Cirimwami and the capture of new territory. In recent weeks, the M23 captured the towns of Minova, in South Kivu, and Masisi, in North Kivu, ahead of taking the city of Goma last night. ALSO READ: US envoy urges DR Congo to uphold Luanda process The rebels demand direct peace talks with the Congolese government, which has ruled out any possibility of talks with the rebels, accusing them of being a terrorist movement. Regional initiatives have failed to end the war politically, with the Congolese government pursuing a military solution.
