Bonino calls on Rwanda for "humanitarian corridors"

THE EU Commissioner for Humanitarian Affairs, Ms Emma Bonino, yesterday called on the Rwandan government to adhere to international human rights conventions and to allow a "humanitarian corridor" to funnel aid to the nearly one million Hutu refugees in eastern Zaire.

She reminded Kigali that the overwhelming majority of the refugees were its citizens and thus, primarily, its responsibility.

Speaking to The Irish Times, the Commissioner also spoke of the need for some form of international military protection for food convoys.

The EU's response to the crisis will be discussed on Thursday at a meeting here of development ministers to which representatives of the major aid and UN agencies have also been invited. Ms Bonino said that their ability to intervene would depend on the results of today's meeting of regional leaders in Kenya.

But the commissioner insisted that there should be no delay beyond that. "This is not a time for political rituals. While international pressure must continue to secure the holding of a regional summit in Nairobi, the agony of these refugees cannot depend on the latter's successful outcome, and their inhumane conditions cannot wait to be alleviated for the end of the US elections or the umpteenth meeting of the UN Security Council. Now is the time to act quickly before a humanitarian disaster turns into an international scandal."

Ms Bonino warned, however, that the international community would also have to face up to the issue of some form of military intervention. "Nowadays, without the protection of some military force, we are prevented from helping. I think this is the first time, to my knowledge, in the last 50 years in which humanitarian conventions have been completely broken and that not even the Red Cross, which has a particular mandate to assist the victims of war, is being allowed to go in.

Certainly we have to call for a ceasefire and the opening of humanitarian corridors but these have to be protected because the refugees, the humanitarian personnel and the convoys have to be protected. If we arrive with a convoy in the camp of Mugunga, with 800,000 people who last saw food last week, we will just be assaulted by the refugees themselves."

She expressed a preference for an inter African force, maybe with financial and logistical support from other states, but said it was not clear if it would be possible at this time.