Word: mobutu
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...organized by President Joseph Mobutu's Mouvement Populaire Revolutionnaire, the only legal political party in the Congo. Outside the Belgian embassy in Kinshasa, it began to work up quite a head of steam for its "spontaneous anti-imperialist demonstration." Primary object was to protest the seven-week-old rebellion of the Congo's white mercenaries, who were fired by Mobutu and subsequently captured the border city of Bukavu by force. Loudspeaker trucks promised immediate satisfaction to all loyal Congolese right there in Kinshasa. Before the shouting was over, announced the sound trucks, the Belgian, French and British ambassadors...
...Belgian embassy, invaded an adjacent apartment building and mauled an American Army sergeant and his wife who were trapped inside. Then it moved on to hurl rocks at the French cultural center and the American and British embassies, loot shops and set fire to cars along the way. Before Mobutu decided that it was time for him to ask the rioters to go home, they had torn down a 35-ft.-high bronze statue of Belgium's King Albert I that had been a city landmark for years...
When the Congo's white mercenaries revolted last month, it seemed hardly possible that their rebellion could end in anything but defeat. The "meres," after all, number only 160 men, backed up by 1,500 or so dissident Katangese troops, while President Joseph Mobutu's Congolese National Army is 30,000 strong. Moreover, the rebel commander, Major Jean Schramme, is not a soldier; he is a Belgian plantation owner who has lived in the Congo for 23 of his 36 years. But last week it was "Black Jack" Schramme and his mercenaries who held the upper hand...
...After establishing his headquarters in Bukavu's Royal Residence Hotel, he set up a "government of public safety" headed by a Katangese captain, and made sure that 300 white civilian refugees from the fighting were escorted safely across the border into Rwanda. Then he issued an ultimatum giving Mobutu ten days in which to negotiate for peace. Among Schramme's terms: that Mobutu return democratic government to the Congo, annul the treason conviction of ex-President Tshombe (who is now in an Algerian jail awaiting extradition) and make Tshombe a member of the Cabinet...
...Kinshasa, Mobutu immediately rejected the ultimatum and said that he would "never stoop to negotiate with assassins." If he does not change his mind, warned Schramme, "I'll take measures of a greater scope. We are in a position of strength. We have shown that the Congolese National Army is incapable of defeating us. Who knows, I could even go so far as launching an offensive against Kinshasa...