On the recordNovember 29, 2012
let me compliment Senator Durbin for his concern for this activity that is going on there. I wish to clarify the record because I have had personal conversations with the President and with many members of the staff and good friends over there. Africa is a little bit different than other areas. Sometimes there can be rebel groups within a country that are doing something people attribute to a country. In this case, that isn't true with Rwanda. In the case of Rwanda, if they say that some of the Rwandan military was supporting the M23 movement, that would not be with the authority or the knowledge even of President Kagame himself and his administration. I want to make sure to clarify that. Also, I want to mention, the area of Goma that the Senator from Illinois is talking about is something that a lot of people are not-- they don't understand what that is. Goma is in the far eastern part of Congo. The capital is Kinshasa. It is further from Kinshasa to Goma than it is, of course, all the way across this country twice. So we are talking about an area where there is not much control. It happens that Robert Ruberwa, Parliamentarian Ruberwa, is the one who is responsible for that area. The way it is working there, they don't have any control over there. This is a rebel movement. The reason I say I believe, and I have always believed, that there is a relationship between the LRA and the M23 is because I was over there when the LRA had just left.…
