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Congo Fighting Separates Families

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 14, 2008

KIBATI - Rebecca Nyiringindi scanned the sprawling refugee camp in eastern Congo, searching for just one person among the thousands of hungry and homeless.

"My mother's name is Alphonsine," the 10-year-old said softly, sucking her thumb. "She's short. She's very dark."

Rebecca was among more than 150 children searching for their parents Thursday in a camp in Kibati, just miles from where soldiers and Tutsi rebels guarded a tense front line, raising fears that fighting would resume in this mineral-rich region.

Some 70,000 refugees have fled to Kibati since fighting intensified in eastern Congo in August, displacing at least 250,000 people despite the presence of the largest U.N. peacekeeping force in the world.

Aid agencies took advantage of a lull in fighting this week to return to camps near the front line and resume registering children who were separated from their parents during the conflict in Congo's North Kivu province.

Some were clearly traumatized. Zawadi Bunzigiye, 6, stared down at her grubby blue dress and said, in a voice barely above a whisper, "I'm afraid of bullets."

The Associated Press

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