Congo Peace Accord Calls for Cease-Fire

GOMA, Congo — Years of fighting in Congo's restive east ended — on paper at least — yesterday as warlords and militia fighters signed a long-awaited peace accord with the government of this huge Central African country.

The deal commits all sides to an immediate cease-fire, followed by a pullback of fighters from key areas that will become a U.N.-patrolled buffer zone, a government spokesman for the talks, Vital Kamerhe, said.

Observers praised the deal but said fulfilling it would be long and difficult work, with many details yet undecided.

In the five years since the end of back-to-back wars that destroyed much of Congo, violence continued to plague the eastern border region.

Local militias clashed with each other, with army forces and with perpetrators of the 1994 Rwandan genocide who took refuge in eastern Congo's little-policed hills.

Rights groups have accused all sides of pursuing rape campaigns and forcing underage boys to enlist as fighters.

A representative for the main insurgent leader, Laurent Nkunda, was the first to sign the document in a ceremony attended by President Kabila. Delegates for other armed groups followed.

The peace deal gives militia fighters amnesty from prosecution for insurgency or acts of war, but not for war crimes or crimes against humanity, Mr. Kamerhe said.

Mr. Kabila called on the signatories to finally "stop this machine that has produced plunderers, rapists, and warlords."

Most of the unrest has been linked to Mr. Nkunda, a former general who broke with the government and established a fiefdom in north Kivu province with the support of his defecting battalions.

Mr. Nkunda and the government have previously agreed to ceasefires, but battles have continued to break out. Fighting between his forces and the army has forced some 800,000 villagers to flee their homes in the past year.

A longtime Congo researcher for Human Rights Watch, Anneke Van Woudenberg, warned that the deal was only the beginning of a "tough road," with many potential pitfalls.

Most of the details of the buffer zone and other agreements have been left to a technical committee still to be formed. It is unclear how former Rwandan fighters, who were not at the talks, will be dealt with, or how strongly the deal will hold warlords like Mr. Nkunda to account for war crimes.

An American government representative at the talks, Tim Shortley, cautiously called the deal "a new chance for peace, security and development."

The two-week talks aimed to bring all factions together for a comprehensive deal and drew nearly 1,300 participants.

Old rivalries had seemed likely to block any agreement, right up until yesterday morning. Mr. Nkunda's representatives started the day saying they were walking out of the talks, but later appeared.

A spokesman for Mr. Nkunda's delegation said they had made compromises — agreeing to only partial amnesty, for example — with an eye toward the need for peace in the troubled region.

"We were obliged to sign to give Congolese a chance to live in peace and security in the east of the country," Seraphin Mirindi said.

U.N. officials praised the deal.

"The full implementation of the commitments made at Goma will mean that the people of the [Kivu provinces], especially the women and children, can look forward to a better future, free of violence," the representative of the U.N. secretary-general in Congo, Alan Doss, said.

Congo has been struggling to establish itself as a functioning democracy since the end of 1998–2002 wars that pulled in armies from a half dozen neighboring countries.

Congo's death rate is about 60% higher than the rest of sub-Saharan Africa, according to a survey released Tuesday.

Congo took a major step toward stability in 2006 with its first free and fair vote in more than 40 years, but Mr. Kabila has struggled since to contain the bloody insurgency in the east while confronting widespread government corruption and a war-decimated infrastructure.