Congo holds 2 activists who assailed oil deals

PRETORIA — Republic of Congo authorities yesterday arrested two activists — who had sharply criticized the country’s oil deals as corrupt — for allegedly stealing money from their nonprofit organizations, according to Global Witness, a London-based group that has called on African countries to be more transparent in their oil contracts.

Christian Mounzeo, president of Rencontre pour la Paix et les Droits de l’Homme, and Brice Mackosso of the Catholic Justice and Peace Commission, were being held in jail and at first were denied access to a lawyer, according to Sarah Wykes, a Global Witness researcher. She said that attorney Maitre Senga eventually was allowed to see Mounzeo and Mackosso.

Senga could not be reached for comment last night. Two senior Congolese officials also could not be reached by telephone.

Late last year, the World Bank delayed Congo’s application for debt relief because of what it called irregularities in Brazzaville’s oil contracts, including the existence of numerous private companies controlled by government officials who sold the country’s oil by using a maze of transactions. But two months later, the executive boards of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund agreed to cancel $2.9 billion in debt as long as the country met several obligations toward reducing the country’s high poverty levels.

Boston Globe