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NEWS STORY
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War in Congo kills 45, 000 people each
month |
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The Guardian
Chris McGreal
January 23, 2008
A decade of fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo is
continuing to kill about 45,000 people each month - half of them
small children - in the deadliest conflict since the second
world war, according to a new survey.
The International Rescue Committee said preventable diseases
and starvation aggravated by conflict have claimed 5.4 million
lives since the beginning of the second Congo war in 1998,
equivalent to the population of Denmark. Although the war
officially ended in 2002, malaria, diarrhoea, pneumonia and
malnutrition continue to claim thousands of lives.
The study of 14,000 households across Congo between January
2006 and April 2007 found that nearly half of all the deaths
were of children under the age of five, who make up only 19% of
the population.
"The majority of deaths have been due to infectious diseases,
malnutrition and neonatal- and pregnancy-related conditions.
Increased rates of disease are likely related to the social and
economic disturbances caused by conflict, including disruption
of health services, poor food security, deterioration of
infrastructure and population displacement. Children ... are
particularly susceptible to these easily preventable and
treatable conditions," the IRC survey says.
Congo has endured two foreign invasions and protracted civil
war since the aftermath of Rwanda's genocide spilled across the
border in 1994 with an influx of more than a million Rwandan
Hutu refugees. The years of conflict resulted in millions of
people fleeing their homes, sometimes to live for years in
forests where many died, and the collapse of what infrastructure
still remained after decades of neglect under Mobutu Sese Seko.
Those who returned home found water sources, health clinics
and farms destroyed. Marauding bands of armed men were
responsible for mass rape, particularly in the east of the
country, which made it much more difficult for women to venture
into fields to grow food.
"When war destroys a country's economy and infrastructure,
there's no quick fix," said Dr Richard Brennan, one of the
survey's authors. "Significant improvement in Congo's health and
mortality will require years of unwavering commitment from the
government and the international community and substantial
financial investment. Sadly, the humanitarian crisis in Congo
continues to be overlooked and funding remains disproportionate
to the enormity of need."
The IRC said that a peace deal in the eastern province of
North Kivu, where fighting has displaced hundreds of thousands
of people in recent months, is also crucial to curbing the
rising death toll.
There was hope yesterday that the conflict in the east might
finally be drawing to a close after the government and armed
groups were reported to be ready to sign a peace agreement. But
the deal apparently did not directly address how to deal with
two of the most important armed factions - that of the rebel
Tutsi general, Laurent Nkunda, who is wanted for war crimes, and
the Rwandan Hutu group that has been a leading cause of
instability.
Congo is one of 11 countries where 20% of children die before
the age of five, according to a Unicef report released
yesterday. A child born in Sierra Leone has the lowest chance of
surviving until the age of five. The report, the State of the
World's Children, says nearly 9.7 million children under five
died worldwide last year from disease or lack of food.
In Sierra Leone, which is still recovering from an 11-year
civil war, the child mortality rate was 270 deaths per 1,000
births. The average rate in developed countries is six deaths
per 1,000 births.
Twenty-eight of the 30 countries with the highest child
mortality rates are in sub-Saharan Africa. But Unicef said there
have also been successes on the continent. Mozambique has seen a
41% drop in child mortality since 1990.
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