Several embassies, including those of France, were attacked this Tuesday, January 28 in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), by demonstrators denouncing the conflict in the east of the country, we learned from diplomatic sources. The Rwanda, Belgian and United States embassies have also been targeted, smoke escaping from the French representation building, an AFP journalist noted.
The French Minister of Foreign Affairs Jean-Noël Barrot described these attacks as “inadmissible”. “The French Embassy in Kinshasa was attacked this morning by demonstrators, who caused a fire now mastered. These attacks are inadmissible. Everything is done to ensure the safety of our agents and nationals,” wrote on X The head of French diplomacy.
Congolese authorities accused Rwanda of having “declared war” at the DRC. France, Belgium and the United States are criticized for their inaction in the current crisis.
New meeting at the UN
In the east of the country, the shots still resonate this Tuesday in certain districts of Goma, a large city delivered to the fighting between Congolese armed forces and combatants of the M23 allies to Rwandan troops. The M23 and the Rwandan soldiers entered the city of more than a million inhabitants on Sunday evening and almost as many displaced, after a lightning progression of a few weeks, launched after the failure in mid-December of a DRC-Rwanda mediation under the aegis of Angola. It is still difficult to say which parts of the city have already fallen into the hands of the M23 and the Rwandan army. The South African army has also announced four additional soldiers killed in the DRC, bringing to 17 members of the regional force of southern Africa (Samirdc) and the UN Mission (Monusco) who died in recent days in battles against the M23.
It is in this particularly tense context that a new meeting of the United Nations Security Council on the DRC is scheduled for the afternoon. After a previous meeting on Sunday, the Congolese government had castigated a “vague” UN declaration without a clear requirement in Rwanda to leave the Congolese soil. Several thousand Rwandan troops are present in the region, according to the UN.