Congo-Kinshasa: Hate Messages Targeting ‘White People’ Spark UN Concerns

The top United Nations envoy to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has expressed concern about hate messages in the local media, which are inciting Congolese to target and take revenge on “white people and foreigners,” a spokesman for the world body said today.

The Secretary-General’s Special Representative in the DRC, William Lacy Swing, made his feelings known this morning, following yesterday’s decision by the Congolese High Authority on Media to suspend for 24 hours the local RTAE and CCTV television stations because of the broadcasts.

CCTV television station is owned by presidential candidate and current Vice-President Jean-Pierre Bemba, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters in New York, adding that the official Congolese Broadcasting Corporation television station has also been suspended for 24 hours on similar grounds.

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