President Paul Kagame has stated that he will not cave to any amount of pressure to re-open his border with Uganda.
These remarks were made on Wednesday when Kagame hosted the annual diplomatic luncheon for diplomats and representatives of international organizations at the statehouse in Kigali.
The Uganda-Rwanda border was closed in February last year blocking her citizens from travelling to Uganda. Rwanda blocked several Ugandan cargo trucks from crossing to Rwanda citing construction works.
Kampala accuses Kigali of slapping a trade embargo on Uganda; aggressive espionage, uprooting prominent Ugandans from the Rwandan economy and starting a hate campaign against some Ugandan officials.
But Rwanda vehemently accuses Uganda of supporting Rwandan rebels, arresting and harassment of its nationals.
“Recently the progress is that some of the people who have been held in prison for months or years were released, nine of them… Some of them have been dying as they arrive back home. If you do a post-mortem you find they have been tortured very badly…” Kagame told the diplomats at the luncheon.
The border closure continues to trigger an economic and social impasse for not only the communities living along the border but the entire East African region.
Earlier this month a resident of Kabingo village in Kisoro a one Teojen Ndagijimana was shot and killed three kilometres away from the Ugandan border at Kumugu Trading Centre in Musanze District in Rwanda.
Kazooba, however, appealed to Ugandans to avoid crossing porous borders until the tension between the two countries is ironed out.
Following the agreement between Museveni and Kagame signed in Luanda the Angola Capital on 21st August 2019, Uganda has kept its side of the bargain by releasing Rwanda nationals who were charged in courts of law with illegal repatriation of Rwandan refugees.
They were handed over to Rwanda authorities as part of the implementation of the Luanda Memorandum of Understanding.
Rwanda was expected to open the border in return, but President Kagame’s hold onto the border closure almost indefinitely sheds more light on Rwandans who are still jailed and Uganda’s alleged support of Rwanda rebels in the eastern DR Congo.
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