Congolese Warlord Wanted for War Crimes Surrenders to U.S. Diplomats in Rwanda

A Congolese warlord whose troops were routed over the weekend walked into the United States Embassy in Rwanda on Monday and asked to be sent to The Hague to stand trial for war crimes. Stephen Rapp, the U.S. ambassador-at-large for war crime issues, confirmed that diplomats are working to facilitate the transfer of the rebel leader, Gen. Bosco Ntaganda, who was indicted by the International Criminal Court on seven counts of war crimes and three counts of crimes against humanity.

Bosco #Ntaganda surrenders in #Rwanda and asks to the taken to the #ICC. We are helping to facilitate his transfer.

â€" Amb. Stephen J. Rap (@StateDept_GCJ) 18 Mar 13

As Britain’s Channel 4 News explained last year, despite an international warrant for General Ntaganda’s arrest, he lived openly in eastern Congo after making peace with the government in 2009. (Be warned, the video report includes graphic images of victims of a 2008 massacre blamed on General Ntaganda’s forces.)

That changed last year when President Joseph Kabila, under pressure from the international court, called publicly for General Ntaganda’s arrest and the warlord, also known as “The Terminator,” led hundreds of his former followers back into open rebellion.

Several close observers of the region, including the New Yorker correspondent Philip Gourevitch, noted that the warlord€™s decision to surrender himself to American diplomats drew attention to the fact that the U.S. is not a signatory to the court, but has pledged to support it.

Hearing Bosco Ntaganda took taxi to US Embassy KIgali. A survivor’s move. How will non-ICC signatory USA in non-signatory Rwanda handle it

â€" Philip Gourevitch (@PGourevitch) 18 Mar 13

Fiona Lloyd-Davies, who produced and shot the report on the warlord for Channel 4 News, also made a film in support of a Human Rights Watch campaign! to b! ring General Ntaganda to justice, featuring interviews with some of his victims.

A rape victim and a former child soldier described their ordeals at the hands of Bosco Ntaganda’s forces in a video report made for Human Rights Watch in late 2011.

Ms. Lloyd-Davies described meeting General Ntaganda in a BBC radio report and a post on her blog, illustrated with a snapshot she took of the grinning warlord at home, holding his six-year-old son and “looking like the perfect dad.”

In 2011, the same filmmaker produced a report on the work of Masika Katsuva, a rape victim in eastern Congo who helps “survivors of the worst brutalities imaginable, multiple rapes and violent assaults,” recover from the trauma and rebuild their lives.