9th December 1996, RPF Inkotanyi soldiers ambushed and shot dead seven hundred (700) Hutu refugees, including a large number of women and children at the Hombo bridge, at Hombo village located on the border between North Kivu and South Kivu, on Bunyakiri-Walikale road.
Over the course of the following days, they burned alive an unknown number of refugees along the road in the town of Kampala, a few kilometres from Hombo. Most of the victims were sick, elderly or physically disabled people who no longer had the strength to escape. Many women were raped by the soldiers before they were killed.
A few days later, RPF soldiers intercepted and executed 520 more refugees in the vicinity of the village of Chambucha, four kilometres from Hombo. The victims, who included a large number of women and children, were shot dead or killed by blows of hammers and hoes to the head near a bridge over the Lowa River. Most of the bodies were then dumped in the Lowa River.
Victims of Hombo bridge were survivors of earlier massacres in Shanje in the Kalehe territory on 21st and 22nd November 1996, who had also survived the earlier massacres of the Kashusha/INERA camps on 2nd of November 1996.
RPF’s Walikale checkpoints
During the third week of December 1996, RPF troops killed around 600 Hutu refugees in the Musenge locality, between Hombo and Walikale. The soldiers had set up several checkpoints along the roads to intercept the refugees. They killed them with blows of iron bars in the hills of Ikoyi and Musenge, next to the dispensary.
In the days that followed, the RPF soldiers continued their hunt, attacking refugees in the villages of Kilambo, Busurungi (Bikoyi Koyi hill), Nyamimba and Kifuruka in the Walowa-Luanda Groupement in the Walikale territory. The soldiers had set up several checkpoints along the roads to intercept the refugees.
On 17 December 1996, RPF soldiers from Ziralo (South Kivu), Bunyakiri (South Kivu) and Ngungu (North Kivu) surrounded the makeshift camps at Biriko and killed hundreds of refugees, including women and children. The soldiers shot the victims dead or killed them with hoes. The people of Biriko buried the bodies in the village. Many bodies were also dumped in the Nyawaranga River.
In the same month, RPF soldiers killed several hundred refugees in the Mutiko locality. After being intercepted at checkpoints set up by the soldiers, the victims were transported to the village of Mukito. The soldiers asked them to prepare to board UNHCR trucks that were supposedly waiting for them at the edge of the village. The victims were then led out of Mukito on to the road and killed with blows of hammers and axes to their heads. The soldiers encouraged the indigenous population to participate in the killings. They then forced them to bury the bodies.
“There was a camp here a few days ago. People were sick, hungry and too weak to walk. Now, where are they? We are very concerned about their lives and we need answers from the [Tutsi] rebels about their fate” ~ Mr Filippo Grandi, a representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).