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KINSHASA, Sept 7 (AFP) - A United Nations team investigating suspected massacres of Rwandan refugees in the Democratic Republic of Congo can resume work, the country's foreign minister said on television late Saturday.
Bizima Karaha said Kinshasa had obtained an assurance from UN Secretary-general Koffi Annan that the mission "will respect the terms of its work set out by common agreement."
He did not spell out what were the terms referred to, but said the UN team would be operating in the interior of the former Zaire, not in Kinshasa.
The UN mission arrived in Kinshasa on August 24 after a number of delays since April, only to face new obstacles on the part of the government of Laurent Kabila.
US ambassador to the United Nations Bill Richardson said Friday that the UN Security Council was expected to give Kabila until Monday to "clarify" his position on the UN probe.
"It's critically important that the UN human rights investigative mission has full and unimpeded access immediately," added Richardson.
The statement came after Karaha told Annan on Monday that Kinshasa had lifted its conditions to the investigation.
Annan asked for written confirmation of the decision, but Reconstruction Minister Etienne-Richard Mbaya and Interior Minister Mwenze Kongolo made it clear on Thursday that no letter would be forthcoming.
The World Bank said Friday that aid for the Kabila government, whose forces toppled Zairean dictator Mobutu Sese Seko in May, would depend on its respect for democracy and human rights, including cooperating with the UN mission.
Kabila's forces, backed by the Tutsi-led government in Rwanda, advanced from eastern Zaire amid allegations that they had massacred large numbers of Hutu refugees who had fled Rwanda in 1994 in the aftermath of a mass slaughter of Tutsis by Hutu extremists.
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