Word: rebels
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...Africa's most durable dictator, Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire, finally came to an end on Thursday, when his three top generals asked for an urgent meeting. The trio was uncharacteristically blunt. They told Mobutu they could no longer protect him or the capital of Kinshasa from the approaching rebel army of Laurent Desire Kabila, and that if Mobutu valued his life he should flee. A commander had driven to the front east of Kinshasa that morning and concluded that government soldiers would not fight to save Mobutu's crumbling regime...
...deal between the two adversaries. Richardson told TIME that last week he had urged Kabila to reassure the world. "You need to issue a public statement about your intentions," the ambassador told him. "You need to calm fears. You need to say that you want democratic elections." But the rebel leader only laughed and said, "You have a lot of advice...
...even before Mobutu left the capital, it was clear who was actually in power. U.S. intelligence sources said that throughout last week top army commanders were calling rebel leader Kabila, who already controlled three-quarters of the country, to pledge their allegiance. On Saturday morning Kabila's ragtag forces marched into the capital without serious opposition and by that night had taken full control. Hundreds of Zairians took to the streets, many of them wearing white headbands and holding palm fronds as signs of support. "Congo libere!" they shouted. "We are free! Kabila is here...
Although he spent several hours talking to Mandela, it is still not certain that Kabila has accepted the South African's proposal: a 10-point plan that would put the rebel leader at the head of a coalition of opposition groups and guarantee elections within a year. What Mandela and the U.N. and U.S. negotiators had in mind was for Kabila to accept power from parliament speaker Laurent Monsengwo, Archbishop of Kisangani, who was installed in office for that purpose...
...ouster was the culmination of a seven-month military campaign that began as an uprising among Tutsi tribesmen in southeastern Zaire after they were ordered expelled from the country. With backing from the anti-Mobutu governments of Uganda, Rwanda and Angola, Kabila took control of and expanded the rebel movement, sweeping east to west across the vast Central African nation almost without opposition until he was camped on the doorstep of Kinshasa. Pushed before him in the jungle were hundreds of thousands of Hutu refugees from Rwanda, many of whom are believed by aid workers to have died violently...