?An immediate ceasefire is desperately needed. Fresh fighting around the town of Kibati today just 2kms north of Goma forced thousands of weary people to flee in panic yet again and seriously jeopardizes the ability of aid agencies like Oxfam to help them.

?The UN peacekeeping force needs more troops not just greater powers. There are clearly not enough troops to provide the security and protection so desperately needed not just around Goma but elsewhere in eastern Congo as well.

?It?s one thing to sit in Nairobi deliberating about what needs to be done. We have had a lot of talk about action—we now need to see that talk put into action.?

In camps across North Kivu women have been raped while searching for food and firewood and forced into doing humiliating tasks at gunpoint. Children, separated from their families, are recruited into armed groups.

"People have told us that they feel like they are the living dead and that their lives no longer have any value. The world needs to show them that that is not true, by redoubling their efforts to secure a ceasefire and by providing immediate additional support to the UN peacekeepers. It is clear that hundreds of thousands of people in eastern Congo are not getting the protection they desperately need," said Juliette Prodhan, head of Oxfam in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Some findings from the assessments include:

• In Kanyabayonga—which lies 30 kilometers north of the conflict's frontline—increasing numbers of armed men are creating havoc, with rape cases spiraling and stealing, looting and harassment becoming commonplace. It is reported that armed men are stealing money, food and even jerry cans of water, leaving people with nothing. Over 66 cases of rape were treated in nearby clinics last week, but the real number is likely to be much higher, as many people do not seek treatment or report their rapes due to the stigma faced by victims of this crime. When Oxfam teams last visited in May there were half a dozen cases of rape in a week.
• In the Kibati area, and further south towards Sake and Minova, forced labor and sexual violence are plaguing the communities, with residents forced to carry water and firewood for armed men. Women are routinely threatened by rape in Kibati and have been attacked when seeking food in the banana fields or collecting firewood. Women in other camps south of Goma report similar problems. In one camp, there is no plastic sheeting left on any of the residents' makeshift shelters, as all of it has been stolen by armed groups.
• Children are arriving in camps and communities alone because they became separated from family members as they fled. These children are vulnerable to forced recruitment by armed groups, and other abuses. There have been three reported cases of forced recruitment of young boys in Kibati, and in Sake and Minova many people are fleeing highland villages in the surrounding mountains because of this threat. Thirty seven children were recruited into armed groups in Rutshuru town last week, according to child protection agencies.
• In Kanyabayonga, many people are forced to keep running, with thousands heading further north to find a respite from violence. Most of the displaced in this area are from the center of the fighting in Kiwanja and Rushuru.

"There is nowhere to hide from eastern Congo's brutal violence; it follows people to places of supposed sanctuary and safety. With increased reports of rape, forced labor, and harassment by armed men in the camps and communities, it is no surprise that biggest priority amongst people is security. Many have fled for the second, third, or even fourth time. They are sick of the violence and want it to end," said Prodhan.

Oxfam is calling for immediate additional military support for the UN's peacekeeping force, MONUC, to help stop the violence, provide security, protect civilians and allow aid agencies to provide help to those that desperately need it. As Oxfam's assessments show, the peacekeepers are clearly struggling to keep the long-suffering people of Congo safe.

Redeploying troops from elsewhere in the Kivu provinces and eastern Congo is not an option as other parts of the region are also insecure and in danger of all-out conflict. To do so would leave civilians elsewhere vulnerable to attack. In Dungu in the northwest Orientale Province thousands have been forced to flee an upsurge in fighting, including 57,000 in recent attacks on 1 and 2 November.

"There appears to be no urgency in the international community's talks on the crisis, but this is a deeply urgent situation. The world is failing in its responsibility to protect Congo's innocent civilians," said Prodhan.

Deployment of extra troops must be combined with sustained diplomatic pressure to achieve a political solution and address the underlying causes of the conflict.

Oxfam is calling on the UN's special envoy Olusegun Obasanjo to unify peace efforts and find a sustainable solution to this protracted conflict.

"My trip with Oxfam to the Democratic Republic of Congo was a mind blowing odyssey into the heart of Africa, equal parts informative and inspiring. It is a country filled with iron-willed people, suffering through one of the worst humanitarian situations on the planet. Oxfam is doing a lot of good work, but there is still much more to be done," said Hirsch.

The DRC is the most deadly conflict since World War II, where over 5.4 million people have died, 1.3 million are displaced, and violence and rape are a daily threat.

He began his trip in the poverty-stricken Maniema Province where Oxfam is working with former child soldiers to disarm and re-integrate them back into their home communities. In some cases, the children were forcibly taken from their homes to become fighters during the height of the conflict. These men are now working with their communities to attain forgiveness for wrongs committed and to work towards a peaceful future.

Hirsch's visit concluded in the province of North Kivu, where conflict is still affecting the population. At two camps for Internally Displaced People, he spoke with families driven from their homes by armed groups and saw the cramped conditions of over 9,000 people waiting for safe conditions which will allow them to return to their villages. Oxfam is providing water and sanitation to over 40,000 people that live in the four camps in the Goma, North Kivu area. Oxfam's President, Raymond C. Offenheiser, stated that the actor's involvement can help keep the international community focused on this chronic emergency.

"By supporting Oxfam, Emile can help shed light on the issues facing Congo at this critical time. The people of Congo need our help to feel safe and protected and to keep the country on the path to peace. They have not lost hope for a better future, and we must keep that hope alive. Emile's visit emphasizes that the people of Congo are not alone," said Offenheiser.

Since Hirsch's return from the DRC, an additional quarter of a million people have been forced from their homes due to increased violence and the situation is rapidly deteriorating.

"The good people on this earth cannot turn a blind eye to Congo now, at a time when once again they are on the brink of absolute crisis. By keeping the world's attention on Congo, it puts pressure on the leaders of our planet to take immediate diplomatic action. This may be the only way change will ever come to Congo. After visiting Goma earlier this year, it saddens me to think that many of the people I talked to in the camp are now even worse off, as chaos threatens to envelope them once again. My thoughts are with them," said Hirsch.

The first report from the Congo Advocacy Coalition reveals that at least 150,000 people have been forced to flee from their homes since the Goma peace agreement was signed on 23 January, 2008, due to ongoing fighting. United Nations officials reported at least 200 ceasefire violations in under 180 days between January and July. Those newly displaced add to the 1 million people displaced from earlier waves of violence in North and South Kivu. The number of people displaced from their homes in the most affected territories of Rutshuru and Masisi in North Kivu is the highest ever registered.

?The peace agreement has failed to silence the guns, and the people of eastern Congo continue to suffer and to run for their lives,? said Juliette Prodhan, head of Oxfam Great Britain in DRC. ?The parties to the agreement must urgently redouble their efforts to act on the commitments they made to protect civilians.?

Women and girls have been particularly affected by the continued violence. More than 2,200 cases of rape were recorded in June 2008 in North Kivu province alone, representing only a small proportion of the total. At least 200 civilians have been killed in the violence.

The Congo Advocacy Coalition called on the parties to the peace agreement, as well as international facilitators from the United States, the European Union, the African Union and the UN who helped to broker the agreement, and international donors, to redouble their efforts to ensure the signatories adhere to their commitments. Specifically, the coalition called on these actors to:

• Publicly urge all armed groups and the Congolese army to adhere to their obligations under the Goma agreement and send a clear message that ongoing abuses against civilians will not be tolerated and those responsible will be held to account;
• Appoint a special adviser on human rights for eastern Congo to help ensure that human rights concerns, including sexual violence and the recruitment of child soldiers, are central to the peace discussions; and
• Back mediation efforts with funding for programs that help consolidate the peace and ensure protection of civilians, such as disarmament, demobilization and reintegration programs that help combatants find sustainable alternatives to violence, as well as programs that help address the root causes of the conflict through a focus on peace building, reconciliation and land-tenure issues.

In North Kivu, many displaced people found shelter with host families, receiving minimal food and assistance, while others sought safety in displacement camps. Acute malnutrition rates have reached an alarming 17 percent in some areas, well above emergency levels.

Humanitarian agencies have tried to expand their programs since the signing of the peace agreement, but have suffered increased attacks by armed groups and unidentified bandits. At least 36 attacks were recorded since January 2008, the majority ambushes at gunpoint as humanitarian staff attempted to reach vulnerable populations. In the past few weeks, attacks against humanitarian staff on the main road to Masisi town have severely hampered assistance to over 186,000 people.

UN peacekeepers have deployed some 10,000 troops between fighting parties in North and South Kivu, but they are thinly spread and have been unable to stop a number of attacks. Civilians seeking safety often set up camps around the edges of UN deployment sites seeking protection.

An elderly man forced to run for his life and now living in a displacement camp said to the Congo Advocacy Coalition: ?The leaders of the government and the armed groups met in Goma and said they would bring us peace, but instead they kept fighting. We are losing hope. We just want peace so we can go home.?

The Goma agreement, signed by 22 armed groups and the Congolese government, followed a November 2007 agreement between the governments of Congo and Rwanda, known as the Nairobi Communiqu�. This agreement sought to address the issue of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a Rwandan armed group based in eastern Congo. Under Article III of the Goma agreement (?Acte d?Engagement?), all the signatories committed to strictly respecting international humanitarian and human rights law, including ending all acts of violence and abuse against the civilian population.

The two agreements, together with recommendations from the Conference on Peace, Security and Development organized by the government in early 2008, form the basis of the government?s peace program for eastern Congo, known as the Amani Program.

?The Amani Program hasn?t yet made life better for the citizens of eastern Congo,? said Anneke Van Woudenberg, senior Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch. ?The international community and the Congolese government should do what it takes to make the peace program a reality, not just a nice idea. They need to ensure it?s funded properly so it reaches those most in need.?

In a new report, “A Fragile Future,” Oxfam says that without a strong UN presence the Congo could see a return to widespread fighting which would undo the gains made in the historic 2006 elections.

The UN started renewing the mandate of its peacekeeping force (known as MONUC) on February 15 and the agency is urging the UN Security Council to keep MONUC at its current strength.

“Without a substantial and effective MONUC presence, the security situation – which is currently fairly stable – could soon unravel,” said Juliette Prodhan, head of Oxfam in the DRC. “This would be a disaster for the DRC and the wider region. MONUC has brought stability and security to large parts of the country and played an instrumental role in helping the Congolese people with the 2006 elections.

“This is a period of unprecedented opportunity for the DRC – but only if the international community makes the right choices in the next few months. MONUC’s existing resources in DRC are already overstretched. Cutting the current troop strength or resources would spell disaster for communities currently benefiting from MONUC protection,” said Prodhan.

“MONUC should stay at its current strength – at this stage anything else would amount to abandoning civilians in the DRC to a very frightening and uncertain future.”

Instead of looking at reducing troop numbers, Oxfam says the UN Security Council should use the mandate renewal process to improve MONUC’s operational effectiveness.

Peacekeepers’ priority should be protecting civilians, for example by increasing the number of night patrols. They should also establish overall security and humanitarian access in areas where displaced populations are returning to their villages of origin.

Oxfam says MONUC’s long-term exit strategy should be linked to reform of the DRC’s army and police. The DRC’s security sector does not currently have the capacity to protect the civilian population from militia warlords, foreign rebels or local defence forces; only when they are better able to protect civilians should the UN consider reducing the number of MONUC troops.

Notes for editors

1. MONUC is the UN’s largest peacekeeping mission, with 17,000 troops.
2. The DRC was at war from 1998 to 2003, with widespread insecurity continuing in the east of the country. An estimated four million civilians have died as a result of the fighting.
3. The DRC held its first ever national elections in 2006.
4. Oxfam has worked in the DRC since the 1960s. Oxfam affiliates work in eight provinces: Province Orientale (Ituri, Haut-Uélé); North Kivu; South Kivu; Maniema; Bas-Congo; Bandundu; Equateur; and Kinshasa. In eastern DRC, Oxfam International provides emergency assistance – including water, sanitation, and public health promotion – to over 300,000 displaced people. Countrywide Oxfam’s longer-term programmes include education, livelihoods, inter-community dialogue and reconciliation, social and political participation, refugee reintegration, and reinsertion of ex-combatants.

“The Bush Administration must do all that it can to support President Kabila in his efforts to address the longstanding conflict which is once again threatening the lives and safety of hundreds of thousands of civilians,” said Raymond C. Offenheiser, president of Oxfam America.

“The Administration must continue its crucial mediation role to ensure that the legitimate concerns of Congolese citizens are addressed. Both Presidents must make it clear that they will not allow the progress made over the past few years to be jeopardized by renewed fighting,” said Offenheiser.

The election of President Kabila in 2006 brought hopes of peace and stability after decades of misrule and a civil war which claimed the lives of approximately four million civilians and led to the displacement of over one million people. Despite the success of the elections, the continued fighting in the east between rebel groups and government forces is a threat to the tenuous peace in the DRC—one of the world’s poorest countries. The DRC ranks 141st out of 174 countries in the United Nation’s human development ranking.

Since last December, the intense fighting has forced over 370,000 people to leave their homes in the eastern region of North Kivu, the largest surge of internal displacement since the formal end of the civil war in 2003. Unlike displacements in the past, the scale of the latest influx is too great for the displaced to be accommodated by local families.

Meanwhile, increased fighting and insecurity have also severely limited the ability of humanitarian agencies like Oxfam to deliver vital aid to civilians in need.

As the conflict intensifies, growing numbers of civilians are placed in imminent physical danger and serious violations of international humanitarian law continue. These include the recruitment of children by rebel forces, the reported use of forced labor by the national army, and an epidemic of violence against women that is among the worst in the world. A 2004 survey found mortality rates in some parts of the country to be close to 3 times the sub-Saharan average, partly from ongoing conflict but also due to disease, malnutrition, and lack of very basic social services.

In the face of the worsening security and humanitarian situation in DRC, Oxfam also called on the US government to maintain its support for a robust UN military presence while increasing its funding and technical assistance to the reform of Congo’s military forces. Tasked with the mandate to protect civilians, the UN peacekeeping mission in DRC (MONUC), receives one third of its operating budget from the US government. With the mission’s funding up for renewal in December, it is crucial that President Bush pledges to continue his administration’s support.

“Without a substantial and effective MONUC presence, the DRC’s fragile peace could quickly unravel completely, further threatening not only the Congolese people but also the wider region. Until the DRC’s police, military, and judiciary are able to effectively enforce the law and protect civilians, US support for both the mandate and operations of the UN peacekeeping mission there is absolutely vital,” said Offenheiser.

Emile Hirsch said: "My trip with Oxfam to the Democratic Republic of Congo was a mind blowing odyssey into the heart of Africa, equal parts informative and inspiring. It is a country filled with iron-willed people, suffering through one of the worst humanitarian situations on the planet. Oxfam is doing a lot of good work, but there is still much more to be done."

He began his trip in the poverty-stricken Maniema Province where Oxfam is working with former child soldiers to disarm and re-integrate them back into their home communities. In some cases, the children were forcibly taken from their homes to become fighters during the height of the conflict. These men are now working with their communities to attain forgiveness for wrongs committed and to work towards a peaceful future.

Emile's visit concluded in the province of North Kivu, where conflict is still affecting the population. At two camps for Internally Displaced People, he spoke with families driven from their homes by armed groups and saw the cramped conditions of over 9,000 people waiting for safe conditions which will allow them to return to their villages. Oxfam is providing water and sanitation to over 40,000 people that live in the four camps in the Goma, North Kivu area.

Oxfam's President, Raymond C. Offenheiser, stated that the actor's involvement can help keep the international community focused on this chronic emergency.

"By supporting Oxfam, Emile can help shed light on the issues facing Congo at this critical time. The people of Congo need our help to feel safe and protected and to keep the country on the path to peace. They have not lost hope for a better future, and we must keep that hope alive. Emile's visit emphasizes that the people of Congo are not alone," said Offenheiser.