Rwanda expects an agreement mediated by the US will promote peace in eastern Congo
The foreign minister of Rwanda said on Wednesday that he hoped the agreement that U.S. President Donald Trump, the leaders of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and others would sign on Thursday would be a step toward peace. This was said after the army of the Democratic Republic of the Congo was accused of breaking previous peace agreements in recent days.
In the most recent fighting in eastern DRC on Tuesday, the Congolese army and M23 rebels backed by Rwanda accused each other of breaking a ceasefire and trying to break the peace deal. This showed how unstable things are on the ground, even though Trump said the war was over.
Reuters in Washington, D.C., talked to Rwandan Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe, who said that even though there was fighting, there was progress on the ground. “Peace is a process.” Positions feel like they are stable in some way. “There is no more expanding into new areas,” he said.
The so-called Washington Accords for Peace and Prosperity will be signed on Thursday. They are the latest in a series of agreements that the Trump administration has helped to make between the two countries. These include an economic integration framework that aims to bring billions of dollars in Western investment to a region that is rich in minerals like tantalum, gold, cobalt, copper, lithium, and more.
“Of course, the U.S. has brought an ambitious agreement to the table, and we hope that all parties, especially Kinshasa, will see that it’s a chance to seize and end this conflict once and for all,” Nduhungirehe said, praising Trump for giving peace a “economic incentive.”
Rwanda says it has nothing to do with M23 and wasn’t involved in the talks in Qatar that led to a draft agreement for a peace deal between the DRC and the rebels in November.
In his speech, Nduhungirehe said that the Congolese army was attacking the M23 and civilian areas with fighter planes and attack drones.
The military presence of Rwanda in the DRC was called “defensive measures,” and he said that it would only be lifted when Congolese forces “neutralize” the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda. This is a group made up of former Rwandan government members who fled after the 1994 genocide, in which 800,000 people, or 10% of Rwanda’s population, were killed in 100 days.
“We hope everything goes as planned, but as of right now, we haven’t seen any operations against the FDLR start, nor have we seen anything that makes us believe that the DRC is acting in good faith,” he said.
At a news conference in Washington, DRC’s Minister of Communications and Media Patrick Muyaya said that the country had started a campaign to raise awareness that will end before FDLR rebels are disarmed.
Muyaya said that the recent fighting was caused by M23 and was “proof that Rwanda doesn’t want peace.” He also said that he hoped Trump’s role could help make peace agreements on paper work in real life.
He said, “Since we signed this agreement, we’ve been doing our best to make sure we did our part.” We want peace, which means that Rwandan troops must leave and all support for M23 must end. Once that’s done, we can talk about growth and integration.
