November 11, 2000
Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni has told a United Nations investigation team that is he not exploiting resources in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) where he has thousands of troops but he would rather invest scarce funds to develop mineral wealth in his country.
A five-person team from the U.N. Security Council has been in Uganda for five days to investigate whether Uganda participated in the illicit exploitation of the DRC's natural resources of the DRC, an allegation also extended to four other countries which have troops in the Congo, namely Rwanda, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Angola.
"The president told the U.N. experts that Uganda went into the DRC for reasons of security and is not in any way involved in the exploitation of that country's natural resources," a press release from the president's official residence in Kampala said Saturday. "He pointed out that the exploitation of that country's resources is a business that necessitates huge investment funds which Uganda does not have. He said that if the government of Uganda had such resources, the first thing would be to exploit the minerals which are lying idle inside Uganda," it added.
The experts, who have been holding interviews with government officials and people from all walks of life, also visited border points shared between Uganda and the DRC, according to a spokesman for the U.N. Development Programme UNDP, which is cordinating the mission. The U.N. experts held talks with Museveni and his vice-president late in the afternoon Saturday before flying to Rwanda.
Congo, Africa's third largest country is known to have vast resources including gold, diamonds, wolfram, copper and timber. Combatants in the two-year DRC war including Rwanda and Uganda on the side of the rebels based in the east of the country and Angola, Namibia and Zimbabwe which are keeping DRC president Laurent Kabila in power are instead being accused of turning to illegally exploiting the country's wealth.
