The shots still resonate this Tuesday, January 28 in certain districts of Goma. The M23 fighters and more than 3,500 Rwandan soldiers, according to the UN, entered this big city on Sunday which they have been beating for several days. The main city of the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo is about to fall into the hands of this rebel group, opposed to the government of the DRC and supported by neighboring Rwanda.
The M23, or movement of March 23, is part of the hundred armed groups fighting the Congolese forces in the east of the DRC, a region rich in minerals. It is present in the province of North Kivu in the border areas of Rwanda and Uganda and has more than 8,000 combatants, according to the UN. “He owes his name on the date, in 2009, of the signing of an agreement between the National Congress for the Defense of the People (CNDP), a rebellious group led by the Tutsis, and the Congolese government aimed at putting an end to a revolt led by the Tutsi people in eastern DRC, “recalls the British daily The Guardian. Except that the rebels accused Kinshasa of not having implemented this agreement which was, for example, integrating the Tutsis fighters into the army and protecting them.
The M23 was therefore created in 2012, by major rebels Tutsi. That same year, the militia produced important territorial gains in the east of the DRC, in particular by briefly grappling Goma before withdrawing ten days later after an agreement negotiated by neighboring countries. During an resurgence from 2022, the group launched an offensive in North Kivu against the Armed Forces of the DRC and the UN mission in the country. The M23 took control of Rubaya, an important mining city of Coltan last year. According to the UN, it brings in $ 800,000 (£ 644,800) per month in taxes on production and trade in ore.
The M23 accused of many abuses
The rebel group claims that its objective is to safeguard the interests of the Congolese Tutsis and other minorities, in particular by protecting them from the Hutus rebel groups which fled to the DRC after taking part in the 1994 genocide which targeted the Tutsis. However, he is accused of numerous abuses against local populations and regularly suspected of being controlled by neighboring Rwanda. “Since the end of 2022, the rebels of the M23 supported by Rwanda have committed murders, rapes and other manifest war crimes in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo,” wrote in June 2023 long Human Rights Watch.
On Sunday, Kinshasa said Kigali had “declared war on him” by sending new troops to the DRC this weekend – between 500 and 1,000 men according to UN sources. At the microphone of our colleagues from RFIChristophe Lutundula, ex Congolese Deputy Prime Minister and President The Commission for External Relations of the upper Chamber, delivered his analysis: “Kagamé wants to force the president Tshisekedi to negotiate with his protégés, the M23.”
For his part, Antonio Guterres, “deeply concerned about the escalation of violence”, called “the Rwandan Defense forces to stop supporting the M23 and withdrawing from the territory of the DRC”, according to a press release from his door -Sholes.
An aggravated humanitarian crisis
The M23 and the Rwandan soldiers entered Goma, which has more than a million inhabitants and almost as many displaced, after a lightning progression, launched after the failure in mid-December under the aegis of Angola. At least 17 people were killed and 367 injured in these fights in the past two days, according to the balance sheets of several hospitals in the submerged city. New violence has also aggravated a chronic humanitarian crisis in the region.
In eastern DRC, conflicts and rebellions have been linked for over thirty years. “Half a million more people were moved just this month,” said the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo grew on Tuesday on X. The humanitarian situation in Goma is “extremely disturbing” , alerted the UN, which now concentrates its missions on the protection of civilians which “pay the highest price”. The distribution of food aid in Goma is suspended, has warned the organization.