Kigali: Rwanda has urged the United Nations to list the Rwandan Hutu rebel group operating in eastern Congo as a terrorist organisation, Radio Rwanda reported yesterday.

Foreign Minister Rosemary Museminali made the request during a meeting in Kigali with UN Under Secretary General for Peacekeeping Operations Alain Le Roy, the state-run radio station said.

“What we are demanding is that they be considered not just as an armed group, but also as terrorists. It would thus become easier to enforce some of the measures decided against them,” Museminali told the radio.

“There are resolutions against the FDLR (Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda) that have never been implemented,” she added.

The minister also urged the international community to hunt down all FDLR officials and members wherever they are.

Based in eastern DR Congo, the Hutu rebel force, some of whose members took part in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, is thought to consist of up to 6,000 fighters. Early in 2009, the Rwandan army joined Congolese troops in an operation against the FDLR, which scattered the rebels from urban centres in eastern DR Congo, but failed to break their command structure.

Many of the movement’s top political leaders are based in western Europe, including France. In 2001, the US state department included the FDLR - under an earlier acronym - on its Terrorist Exclusion List.