Goal calls for end to cannibalism in Congo

The Government here must bring pressure to bear to end cannibalism and mass rape in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the aid agency Goal has said.

The call from Mr John O'Shea, the agency's chief executive, follows a demand from the UN Security Council last week that rebels fighting in the east of the country halt a campaign of cannibalism, execution, torture and rape.

In the past number of weeks, UN inspectors from its mission in Congo have interviewed hundreds of witnesses and victims of Operation Erase The Blackboard - a plan by the Congolese Liberation Movement, under Mr Jean-Pierre Bemba - aimed at "looting every house and raping every woman".

The UN inspectors spoke of "babies whose hearts were torn out and taken away or given to someone to eat, of small children who were killed, mutilated and of people who were executed in front of their families".

Mr O'Shea said the Government must exert pressure on two of the warring factions in the region. "Ireland has a lever with Rwanda and Uganda as they have received over the last few years considerable overseas aid assistance from the Department of Foreign Affairs," he said. "This puts Bertie Ahern and Brian Cowen in a unique position of influence."

The UN inspectors found 117 instances of arbitrary execution in one four-day period alone. They cited 65 cases of rape, including the rape of children, 82 kidnappings and 27 cases of torture in the same period.

The inspectors named Mr Bemba's movement and the allied Congolese Rally for Democracy-National rebel movement, both of which are fighting the rival rebel Congolese Rally for Democracy-Liberation for mineral-rich areas in the Ituri province.

The Security Council "condemned in the strongest terms the massacres and systematic violations of human rights" perpetrated by both rebel groups. It said Mr Bemba - who hopes to become one of Congo's vice-presidents when a peace agreement is implemented - bore "the responsibility for the security of civilian populations in the territory under his control".

The war in the Congo broke out in 1998 when Rwanda and Uganda joined rebels battling then president Laurent Kabila. Since then more than two million people are thought to have died, mostly from starvation and disease.

A spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs said officials were studying the UN report and continued to "closely monitor" the situation in the west African region.