Rail Hub in Southern Zaire Apparently Falls to Rebels
Rebels continued their relentless march through Africa’s third-largest nation Monday, apparently seizing a strategically important Zairian rail hub even as preparations for peace talks with the government proceeded.
The rebels, called the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire, claimed to have moved into Kamina, a rail hub in the southern province of Shaba, putting them within easy reach of Lubumbashi, Zaire’s second-largest city, news agencies reported.
Lubumbashi, about 270 miles southeast of Kamina, is an important source of the mineral riches that provide most of Zaire’s revenue.
With Kamina apparently in rebel hands, Zairian troops farther south are effectively cut off from a key supply and transport route.
Facing the rebel threat--and intense domestic pressure for change--President Mobutu Sese Seko’s desperate government is expected to begin peace talks with rebel leader Laurent Kabila’s movement later this week in South Africa.
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