Congo Wars

The causes

The genocide against the Tutsi, carried out in Rwanda in 1994, causes an influx of refugees, including leaders and Hutu militiamen, into eastern Zaire. Mobutu's regime, weakened and corrupt, tolerates these armed groups near the Rwandan border. Rwanda and Uganda, worried about their security, then back a rebellion against Mobutu. The country, rich in coltan, gold, diamonds and copper, also attracts the appetites of neighboring countries and foreign companies.

The former Belgian Congo became independent in June 1960, but the country was destabilised from the first months: the secession of Katanga, rich in copper, and the assassination of Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba in January 1961 illustrated the rivalry of the great powers during the Cold War. In 1965, Joseph-Désiré Mobutu seized power in a coup, with, according to historians, American and Belgian support. He then governed through a one-party regime and widespread corruption, and the country, renamed Zaire in 1971, sank into economic crisis. The Shaba rebellions of 1977 and 1978 were contained with external help from France, Belgium and Morocco.

The course of the war

In October 1996, a rebellion, the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo (AFDL), led by Laurent-Désiré Kabila and backed by Rwanda and Uganda, attacks Zaire from the east. It advances rapidly. Mobutu, ill, leaves the country in May 1997 and dies a few months later. Kabila takes power and renames the country the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He soon falls out with his former Rwandan and Ugandan allies, who back new rebellions in August 1998.

The second war begins in 1998 and involves many neighboring countries: Angola, Zimbabwe and Namibia support Kabila, while Rwanda and Uganda back the rebellions. The front freezes in 1999, and ceasefire agreements are signed at Lusaka, without the fighting really stopping. In January 2001, Laurent-Désiré Kabila is assassinated by one of his bodyguards; his son Joseph succeeds him. A peace agreement signed at Pretoria at the end of 2002 provides for power-sharing, and a transitional government is formed in July 2003, officially ending the war. Violence nevertheless continues in the east of the country.

In October 1996, the AFDL seized camps of Hutu refugees near Goma and Bukavu; the refugees scattered either into the interior of the country or into Rwanda, and later investigations documented massacres of civilians during these operations. The AFDL forces, supported by Rwandan soldiers, advanced rapidly through a country whose regular army was very weakened. In spring 1997, the rebellion pushed towards Kisangani. In May 1997, Mobutu left Kinshasa, and Laurent-Désiré Kabila entered the capital without major combat.

From August 1998, Kabila expelled the Rwandan and Ugandan military advisers, and Kigali and Kampala then backed new rebellions. The Congolese Rally for Democracy (RCD) took Goma and Bukavu, while the Movement for the Liberation of the Congo (MLC) of Jean-Pierre Bemba, backed by Uganda, established itself in the north-west. Rwandan and Ugandan forces clashed with each other in Kisangani in 1999. In November 1999, the UN Security Council created the UN mission in the Congo, MONUC, whose deployment remained slow.

In Ituri, clashes between the Hema and Lendu communities, fuelled by the presence of foreign armies and by rivalries over control of land and gold mines, caused numerous victims from 1999 onwards. In June 2003, a European force led by France, Operation Artemis, was deployed to Bunia to protect the civilian population. In 2004, the International Criminal Court opened an investigation into crimes committed in the DRC. In 2006, the country held its first multiparty elections since independence, which brought Joseph Kabila to the presidency.

The consequences

Both wars cause a very heavy human toll, whose estimates vary widely depending on the source. A large share of the deaths results from disease and hunger rather than direct fighting, according to several mortality surveys. Armed groups continue to commit violence in the east of the country, and the illegal exploitation of mineral resources, documented in UN reports, fuels the conflicts.

Historians sometimes speak of an "African world war" to describe the entanglement of state actors and armed groups in these conflicts. A UN report published in 2010 lists a very large number of serious human rights violations committed between 1993 and 2003 on Congolese territory. In 2012, the International Criminal Court convicted Thomas Lubanga, a militia leader in Ituri, the first verdict handed down by that court. Since 2021, the M23 has resumed fighting in North Kivu, and the presence of numerous armed groups makes peace difficult to consolidate.

Timeline

1. 1996A rebellion backed by Rwanda and Uganda attacks Mobutu's Zaire
2. 1997Fall of Mobutu: Laurent-Désiré Kabila takes power
3. 1998Start of the second war, with many neighboring countries involved
4. 2001Assassination of Laurent-Désiré Kabila: Joseph Kabila succeeds him
5. 2003Transitional government: official end of the second war

Key figures

• Mobutu Sese Seko, president of Zaire from 1965 to 1997, overthrown by the rebellion
• Laurent-Désiré Kabila, head of the AFDL, then president from 1997 to 2001
• Joseph Kabila, son of Laurent-Désiré Kabila, who succeeds him as president
• Paul Kagame, Rwandan leader, vice president then president, whose country backs the rebellions