Uganda, DRC Kill Senior Militant Commander in Joint Operation
The Ugandan military called Lubangakane a “daredevil commander” of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) and said they killed three other militants and seized heavy weapons in the eastern Congo operation (Nile Post)
Proposed U.S. Bill Targets Child Labor in DRC Mineral Mining
The U.S. House bill, aimed at Chinese cobalt mining operations, would ban the import of products containing minerals mined by children; previous U.S. legislative attempts to target so-called conflict minerals in the DRC had some success but faced fierce opposition in the DRC for its unintended consequences (Africa News)
Militants Attack Rangers in DRC Wildlife Reserve
One ranger was killed and another injured while patrolling an area of Ituri province’s Okapi Wildlife Reserve known to host illegal mining operations (France 24)
African Leaders Discuss Eastern DRC Conflict
At a summit in Angola, regional leaders emphasized the need for cooperation and joint monitoring efforts and demanded that armed groups withdraw in eastern DRC (Africa News;East African)
United States Warns Against UN Peacekeeping Withdrawal from DRC
Amid continued protests against the UN presence, the U.S. deputy ambassador to the DRC said a MONUSCO departure would create a security vacuum that Congolese forces would likely be unable to fill (AFP)
UN: Rwanda Directly Intervened in DRC
The new report presents evidence that the Rwandan military has operated in eastern DRC to reinforce M23 and attack armed Hutu groups, such as the Forces Démocratiques de Libération du Rwanda (FDLR), which participated in the Rwandan genocide (FT)
Meanwhile, UN experts said the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) is expanding its reach in the DRC with funding from the Islamic State (Reuters)
Leading DRC Opposition Candidate Threatens to Boycott Election
Congo will hold legislative and presidential elections on December 20, but Martin Fayulu, who is thought to have won the 2018 vote, says his party will not participate unless the government is more transparent about voter registration and other aspects of the election (Al Jazeera)
Meanwhile, authorities arrested the right-hand man of Moise Katumbi, expected to be another top contender in the upcoming election, alleging that he collaborated with Rwanda and the M23 movement (Africa Report)
Rebels Launch Cross Border Attack on Ugandan School, Killing Forty-One
The rebels are suspected members of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a rebel group based in eastern Congo that the Ugandan government has fought for decades, and quickly fled across the porous Congolese border following the attack; Uganda has deployed troops across the border since 2021 to try to destroy the group’s strongholds in the DRC (AP;NYT)
Human Rights Watch: M23 Committed War Crimes in DRC
New reports accuse the rebel group of rape and unlawful killings, among other war crimes, following the discovery of mass graves in North Kivu province (HRW;HRW)
Attack on Congo IDP Camp Kills More Than Forty
Local administrators in the northeastern province of Ituri blame the Cooperative for the Development of the Congo (CODECO), a group that claims to protect the Lendu ethnic group from the Hema; attacks on the over 1.5 million internally displaced people in Ituri have become common as the decades-long conflict between the two groups continues (Al Jazeera)
UN Peacekeeping Force to Leave DRC
A UN official said MONUSCO, one of the UN’s largest peacekeeping operations, will leave the DRC “as quickly as possible” in a responsible manner, urging Congolese authorities to step up their response to the conflict in the east to avoid a security vacuum (The East African)
Rwandan President Dismisses Two Hundred Soldiers
President Paul Kagame dismissed more than two hundred soldiers, including senior military officers, according to a statement released today by the Rwandan army; he did not announce a reason for the dismissals, which come amid high tensions with neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo (BBC)
Great Lakes Leaders Approve of Southern African Bloc’s Troop Deployment to DRC
The South African Development Community (SADC) announced its deployment last month, and regional leaders say it will bolster the regional response, though SADC’s previous mission in the DRC was unsuccessful (East African)
SADC officials say the East African Community Regional Force (EACRF), which has been on the ground for a few months, acts too passively and has a friendly approach to the “M23/RDF terrorists” (ISS)
Congo Asks ICC to Probe Alleged Abuses by Rwandan Forces, M23 Rebels
The Democratic Republic of Congo formally requested that the International Criminal Court (ICC) probe alleged human rights violations by the March 23 Movement (M23) rebel group; Kinshasa says Rwanda has assisted the group’s attacks in the eastern Congo, which Kigali denies (Reuters)
Flash Flooding Kills Nearly Four Hundred in Eastern DRC
Rescuers recovered nearly four hundred bodies following flash flooding and landslides in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) last week; authorities previously estimated that two hundred people had died (BBC)
African Bloc to Send Troops to DRC
The sixteen-nation Southern African Development Community said it will send troops to aid the UN peacemakers, troops from the East African Community, and private military forces working to stabilize the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) (Bloomberg)
Rebels Kill Six in East DRC
According to local officials, rebels associated with the Islamic State group attacked a village in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo and killed at least six people (VOA)
Dozens of Bodies Found in Eastern DRC
At least sixty bodies were found across several villages in North Kivu province; M23 rebels killed residents in villages in the Rutshuru territory days before the discovery of the bodies (VOA)
Dozens Killed in Village Attacks
In the province of Ituri, local advocates and journalists reported that an armed group, suspected to be the Cooperative for Development of the Congo (CODECO), killed about thirty people and burned and looted property; since 2017, there have been several organized attacks on communities in Ituri (Al Jazeera)
Twenty Killed in Eastern Congo
Twenty people were killed in a village on the outskirts of Beni in an attack suspected to be by the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a Ugandan group based in eastern Congo that has pledged allegiance to Islamic State; the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement on its Telegram channel (Reuters)
Ugandan Troops in DRC to Join Regional Force
According to an army official and witnesses, a thousand Ugandan soldiers serving with an East African regional military group entered the border town of Bunagana in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo; the soldiers are in the DRC to supervise the withdrawal of the M23 rebel group and act as a “neutral force” according to Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni (AFP)
UN Envoy: Security Situation in Eastern Congo Deteriorating
The UN envoy to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) told the Security Council that the escalating conflict in eastern Congo between various armed groups and government forces has “deteriorated considerably” and worsened the humanitarian situation (UN News)
DRC President Reshuffles Cabinet
President of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) Félix Tshisekedi installed multiple new ministers, including a former vice president who was jailed for eleven years for war crimes; the changes come amid rising insecurity and ahead of elections later this year (The East African)
DRC: Smuggling Costs Country $1bn Annually
DRC’s finance minister said the country was losing nearly $1bn a year in illegally smuggled minerals to Rwanda, which exported a billion dollars’ worth of minerals last year despite having few mineral deposits of its own (FT)
Armed Groups Displaced Over One Hundred Thousand
In the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, more than one hundred thousand people were displaced by armed group attacks in North Kivu province, according to a UN report (UN News)