Tutsi Refugees Flee Congo For Rwanda

More than 3,000 Congolese Tutsis who fled their homes in the Northeast and had been living in a refugee camp here crossed into Rwanda over the weekend fearing attack, spokesmen for two aid agencies said Monday.

They reportedly were part of a group of 7,000 Tutsis who have arrived in Goma over the past several weeks after being attacked by former Rwanda Hutu soldiers and militia. While living in the camp here on the Congo-Rwanda border, they had been protected by Rwandan soldiers.

Rwandan soldiers and officers, most of whom are Tutsis, helped rebel forces, also Tutsis, capture the former nation of Zaire in an eight-month sweep that brought President Laurent Kabila to power in May. The government renamed the country Congo.

Some aid agency workers, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the 3,000 refugees fled to Rwanda because the soldiers themselves had left Thursday.

“It’s not likely a coincidence that these displaced Tutsis left at the same time as the Rwandan soldiers,” said Franke De Jonge, director of the aid agency Doctors Without Borders, which had been supplying water for the displaced Tutsis at the Goma camp.