27 July 2006
One year ago, on 31 July 2005, hugely respected human rights defender Pascal Kabungulu was shot dead in front of his family at his home in Bukavu, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) by three armed men.
Pascal was the Executive Secretary of human rights organisation Heritiers de la Justice. He is survived by his wife Kitumani Kasiba and their six children, who were forced to go into exile shortly after his murder.
Front Line is extremely concerned with the lack of progress of the legal investigations into his death. There have been two separate investigations; the first was a commission of enquiry established by the acting governor, Didace Kaningini. The members of this commission concluded that they could not act on the case as the commission had lost credibility when the governor was accused of fabricating evidence to incriminate members of Heritiers de la Justice.
The Senior Military Prosecutor for the province also initiated a military investigation and three soldiers were arrested on suspicion of killing Pascal. The three men were former soldiers of the Rassemblement Congolais pour la Democratie kk- Goma (RCD-Goma).