SOME 500,000 Hutu refugees are now believed to have crossed into Rwanda after two years in camps in Zaire. There are unconfirmed reports that another 100,000 may be making their way towards the Gisenyi crossing point from the town of Bukavu to the south and returning refugees reports that the same number again are still in forests, afraid to come back.
The Rwandan government has asked for international assistance to help resettle the refugees. It says trucks are needed urgently to bring many children, elderly and sick people to their homes. They also asked for agricultural equipment and seeds to help the returnees rebuild their lives inside the country. The government said that all those who left the country in 1994 will be able to reclaim their property.
Meanwhile, the chaos in the UNHCR directed emergency operation continues. Very little food has been distributed to those on the route home, and supplies within the country are still very low.
Rebel soldiers said yesterday that they had moved at least 30 km into Zaire in the wake of the retreating armed Hutus who fled west last Thursday. They say the armed Hutus, soldiers of the pre 1994 Rwandan army and members of the Interahamwe militias are heading for the town of Masisi, 70 km into the country.
On the roadside 20 km into Zaire yesterday a piece of electrical military equipment from the British company Mil Tec was found. Documents found on the road on Sunday indicated that this company had supplied the former regime with arms after the genocide began and a UN arms embargo was imposed on Rwanda.
Reuter adds: The UN was due to launch an emergency appeal yesterday for $260 million to fund relief operations in eastern Zaire and Rwanda, a UN official said.
A spokeswoman, Ms Madeleine Moulan Acevedo of the UN Department of Humanitarian Affairs (DHA), said the consolidated appeal by UN agencies would be launched in New York.
The sudden flood of Hutus to Africa's most crowded country has caught aid agencies off guard and will put new pressures on the international community to assist them in their communes.
Diplomats also expect a surge in arrests of those accused of participation in the genocide and say lack of prison space will be a problem. Some 90,000 Hutus accused of genocide are already jammed into Rwanda's overcrowded jails.
Meanwhile, Switzerland has denied a visa to Zaire's ailing ruler, President Mobutu Sese Seko, who is currently in France and wants to return to the country for medical treatment, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said yesterday.
President Mobutu (66) underwent more than two months of treatment for prostate cancer in Lausanne, Switzerland before leaving on November 4th for his villa on the French Riviera.
President Mobutu's absence from Zaire has raised fears that his vast central African country may disintegrate following a successful Tutsi revolt in the east. His presence in Switzerland sparked protests from local deputies in Lausanne, who appealed to the federal government to block his return.
Meanwhile, the Rwandan authorities yesterday closed down a Red Cross camp for 350 sick and exhausted Rwandan refugees, a Red Cross spokesman said. Mr Andrew Hall said officials saying they were from the Ministry of Rehabilitation ordered the special Red Cross camp inside Unbano camp near the border with Zaire closed. The refugees inside were taken away in trucks.
Canada is determined to press ahead with the international rescue mission for Central Africa despite the mass return of refugees to Rwanda, Prime Minister Jean Chretien said yesterday. "The mandate is still the same. We have to go there and we have to go for humanitarian purposes," he told reporters.