The rebellion that took him down was supported by at least three neighboring countries. The civil war began in October 1996 with an uprising by members of the country's minority Tutsi people in eastern Zaire, along the country's eastern borders with Rwanda and Uganda. With Mobutu's support, Hutu refugee camps in eastern Zaire had become a base for exiled Hutu militants fighting Rwanda's Tutsi-backed government. Rebels fighting the Ugandan Army had also established guerrilla camps there. The ADFL, which was backed by Rwandan troops and weapons and Ugandan money and weaponry, quickly swept through eastern Zaire. Mobutu, ill with cancer and living in Europe, was unable to invigorate his government or his troops. Talks between the government and the ADFL in April as well as continuing negotiations by other African states and Western nations failed to produce a peaceful settlement of the conflict. On May 17, the rebels captured Kinshasa, the capital. Mobutu went into exile and died on September 7.At his inauguration as president on May 29, Kabila promised to hold a referendum on a new constitution by December 1998 and legislative elections by April 1999. However, Kabila had already banned public demonstrations and activities by political parties. On July 25, 1997, government soldiers shot at least three people during an antigovernment demonstration in …show more content…
In addition, thousands of civilians in rural areas were subjected to attacks by RUF forces and allied groups. In April, the UN Commission for Refugees reported that more than 50,000 Sierra Leoneans had fled to neighboring Guinea. In an effort to end the terror, the government offered the guerrillas an amnesty in April, but the offer was refused. In August, Nigeria returned RUF leader Foday Sankoh to Sierra Leone for trial. He had been arrested in Nigeria in 1997 after arriving to buy arms. In April 1998, the British government launched an investigation into allegations that the British ambassador to Sierra Leone had aided a British mercenary force that had smuggled planeloads of arms to Kabbah's forces in violation of a UN arms embargo. Kabbah reportedly paid the force, known as Sandline International, $10 million to arm and train his supporters. On July 7, 1999, the government of Sierra Leone and the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), the nation's main rebel group, signed a peace accord to end an eight-year-long civil war. Under the accord, the government agreed to cancel the death sentence imposed on RUF leader Foday Sankoh for treason and mass murder and to name him vice president. In