02 12 13 AFP: Congolese president says fight against rebels not over

 

Delivering the keynote speech of a
1,200-kilometre (750-mile) tour of the mineral-rich but deeply unstable region,
Kabila said the surrender of the M23 army mutineers was just one stage in an
offensive against armed groups that have harrowed the east for decades.

"If I say the war is over, in fact it's
only a phase because we still run the risk of a new effort to start a
war," he said in Goma, the capital of North Kivu
province and a key regional hub briefly seized by the M23 in November 2012.

"We are going to continue preparing
ourselves so that we will have a solid, dissuasive army," he told several
hundred hand-picked audience members during an hour-long speech in Swahili, the
language most widely spoken in the area.

"I call on the people of North
Kivu to be vigilant so that we are not surprised by another war.
And if there were another war, I want us to be ready to fight it and win
it."

He repeated an ultimatum for remaining militias
in the region to disarm voluntarily or be disarmed by force.

Kabila's victory lap comes after the Congolese
army and a special United Nations intervention force battled the M23 into
surrender on November 5.

The mainly Tutsi insurgent group, launched by
ex-rebels who had been integrated into the national army under a failed peace
deal, had wrought havoc in the region for 18 months.

The UN accused neighbouring Rwanda and Uganda of backing the group, an
accusation both countries denied.

Kabila did not name the two countries Sunday
but accused DR Congo's neighbours of "putting together armed groups to
destabilise our country".

"Our neighbours… use North Kivu as an
entryway to the Congo,"
he said.

Kabila also announced that in a bid to breathe
new life into government institutions, the heads of state offices would be
changed "before the end of the year".

A source in the president's office said the
overhaul would initially involve the police, army and tax authorities, and
would begin in North Kivu province before
being rolled out elsewhere.

Kabila began his massive motorcade tour of the
region on November 20. On Monday he is due to travel to Uganda's capital Kampala to meet his Ugandan counterpart
Yoweri Museveni, the mediator for the M23 crisis.