Bosco Ntaganda the Congolese rebel leader  has surrendered the US Embassy in Rwanda,Rwandan local media reports

The fugitive Congolese warlord Bosco Ntaganda walked into the US Embassy in Rwanda on Monday   and asked to be transferred to the International Criminal Court (ICC), where he faces war crimes charges racked up during years of rebellion.

Ntaganda’s whereabouts had been unknown after hundreds of his fighters fled into Rwanda or surrendered to UN peacekeepers at the weekend following their defeat by a rival faction of M23 rebels in the mineral-rich eastern Congo.

“He specifically asked to be transferred to the ICC in the Hague,” US State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland told reporters in Washington.  “We are currently consulting with a number of governments, including the Rwandan government, in order to facilitate his request.”

Born in Rwanda, Ntaganda grew up in Congo before fighting alongside Rwandan Tutsi rebels who seized control of the small central Africa country, ending the 1994 genocide in which over 800 000 people died. Ntaganda then returned to Congo, where he took part in a series of rebellions but also served temporarily as a senior general and made a name for himself smuggling minerals.

By UP