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Decades of post-colonial chaos

"Veni, Vidi, Vici, numquam reliquit - ego adduxit inimici mei !"

Belgium wanted Lumumba arrested, Belgium was not particularly concerned with

Lumumba's physical well being.

Although informed of the danger to Lumumba's life, Belgium did not take any action to
avert his death. The report concluded that Belgium had not ordered Lumumba's

assassination.

***
Lumumba's execution was carried out by a firing squad led by Belgian mercenary Julien
Gat; Katangan Police Commissioner Verscheure, who was Belgian, had overall command

of the execution site.The separatist Katangan regime was a surrogate of Belgian mining
conglomerate Union Minière du Haut-Katanga.

The USA

The 2001 report by the Belgian Commission describes previous U.S. and Belgian plots to
kill Lumumba. Among them was a Central Intelligence Agency-sponsored attempt to

poison him, which was ordered by U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower. CIA chemist
Sidney Gottlieb, a key person in the plan, devised a poison resembling toothpaste. In
September 1960, Gottlieb brought a vial of the poison to the Congo with plans to place it

on Lumumba's toothbrush. The plot was abandoned, allegedly because Larry Devlin, CIA
Station Chief for the Congo, refused permission.

***
As well, the CIA station chief helped to direct the search to capture Lumumba for transfer

to his enemies in Katanga. Devlin was involved in arranging Lumumba's transfer to
Katanga, and the CIA base chief in Elizabethville was in direct touch with the killers the

night Lumumba was killed.

***
The inauguration of John F. Kennedy in January 1961 caused fear among Mobutu's

faction, and within the CIA, that the incoming Democratic administration would favor the
imprisoned Lumumba. While awaiting his presidential inauguration, Kennedy had come
to believe that Lumumba should be released from custody, though not be allowed to

return to power. Lumumba was killed three days before Kennedy's inauguration on 20
January, though Kennedy did not learn of the killing until 13 February.

***
In 2013, the U.S. State Department admitted that President Eisenhower authorized the
murder of Lumumba.[175] However, documents released in 2017 revealed that an