* Report weakens Uganda resolve to take part in peacekeeping
* Rwanda threatened to pull out troops due to report
* Burundi has also protested against the draft
By Justin Dralaze
KAMPALA, Sept 30 (Reuters) - Uganda says a draft U.N. report alleging it took part in atrocities in Democratic Republic of Congo will undermine its resolve to take part in African Union and United Nations peacekeeping missions.
The U.N. report, due to be published on Friday, was leaked last month and covers more than 600 serious crimes committed by various forces during the 1993-2003 period in which tens of thousands of people were killed in fighting in Congo.
The report also alleges that Rwandan soldiers may have committed genocide in Congo during the same period.
Rwanda threatened to withdraw its troops from a U.N. peacekeeping mission to Darfur but decided not to after U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon visited Kigali earlier this month. "It is deeply regrettable that the authors ... chose to undermine the efforts of countries of the region to contribute towards regional and international peace and security," Ugandan Foreign Affairs Minister Sam Kutesa wrote in an official response to the United Nations in Geneva.
"Such sinister tactics undermine Uganda&${esc.hash}39;s resolve to continue contributing to, and participating in various regional and international peacekeeping operations such as AMISOM, UNMIS, UNAMID, UNMIL, UNOCI, UNMIT," it said, referring to missions in Sudan, Liberia, Ivory Coast and East Timor.
The Ugandan army has also dismissed the report saying it lacked detail and sound evidence. [ID:nLDE68D1HC]
"COMPENDIUM OF RUMOURS"
Uganda and Burundi have contributed all the troops in an African Union mission in Somalia known as AMISOM that is supported by Washington and is keeping insurgents from overthrowing Mogadishu&${esc.hash}39;s Western-backed government.
Burundi has also protested against allegations in the draft report that its troops committed human right abuses in Congo too.
Kutesa said the report alleged the Ugandan army had committed crimes in an area it had not even deployed into and that his government was not consulted through the process.
"Uganda rejects that draft report in its entirety and demands that it not be published," he said.
Ugandan troops entered Congo in the 1990s to uproot the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a rebel Ugandan group that had established bases there.
Rwanda, on the other hand, invaded Congo ostensibly to hunt down Hutu fighters who had taken part in the 1994 genocide and fled into the east of the country.
U.N. peacekeepers were widely criticised for failing to prevent the Rwandan slaughter of 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus that ended only after Tutsi-led fighters under current President Paul Kagame retook control of the country.
The U.N. report documents several incidents in Congo where Ugandan soldiers are accused of atrocities such as massacres of civilians, torture and destroying critical civilian infrastructure.
"The draft report under reference is a compendium of rumours deeply flawed in methodology, sourcing and standard proof," Kutesa said in the statement.
(Writing by Helen Nyambura-Mwaura; Editing by David Clarke)
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