By Joe Bavier

KINSHASA, July 4 (Reuters) - U.N. human rights chief Louise Arbour on Wednesday criticised a Congolese military court decision that acquitted government soldiers and former employees of Australia's Anvil Mining Ltd of complicity in war crimes.

A military tribunal acquitted nine soldiers last week of war crimes charges including summary executions, torture, illegal detention and looting during a brief armed uprising in the southern town of Kilwa, Katanga province, in 2004.

Canadian Pierre Mercier and South Africans Peter Van Niekerk and Cedric Kirsten, all Anvil employees, were also cleared of wilfully offering logistical assistance to the soldiers.

"I am concerned at the court's conclusions that the events in Kilwa were the accidental results of fighting, despite the presence at the trial of substantial eye-witness testimony and material evidence pointing to the commission of serious and deliberate human rights violations," Arbour said in a statement.

Congo's Justice Minister Georges Minsay told Reuters he had not yet read the decision of the court in Katanga's capital, Lubumbashi, and could not comment on Arbour's statement.

Scores died in a massacre of civilians in Kilwa when government forces launched a counter-attack to retake the town after it was seized by a group of 10 ill-equipped rebels in October 2004, a U.N. human rights investigation found.

Anvil <AVM.TO> <AVM.AX> runs the nearby Dikulushi silver and copper mine and the company's trucks and planes were used by the army during the operation close to Congo's southeastern border with Zambia.

The firm said its vehicles were requisitioned by the military and that it had no choice but to hand them over.

Lawyers for the victims and their families have said they will appeal against the court's verdict.

Two officers received life in prison, and two other soldiers received shorter sentences for lesser crimes unrelated to the Kilwa violence.

Arbour, U.N. high commissioner for human rights, said Democratic Republic of Congo's decision to try the three civilian Anvil employees before a military court violated the country's international obligations.

"During my visit to DRC in May this year, all authorities assured me of their highest commitment to the fight against impunity," Arbour said.

"The victims of serious human rights violations demand concrete signs of such commitment in the form of truth and justice. That is their right," she said.

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