Recent headlines have been relentless: UN and EU pile pressure on Rwanda, Kagame under pressure to stop war in DR Congo, Rwandan envoys in European capitals summoned over war, Senior Rwandan officials sanctioned for role in DR Congo conflict. These follow reports of UN Security Council and European Union Parliament resolutions ordering the M23 rebels to cease fire and withdraw from the areas they have taken. The same resolutions also call on Rwanda to remove its troops from DR Congo. It all looks suspiciously coordinated. The resolutions look remarkably similar to DR Congo government talking points in their diplomatic offensive to have Rwanda punished. The summons are also taking place at the same time and repeat the same talking points. The UN and the West seem to have succumbed to Felix Tshisekedi’s sustained campaign to have Rwanda punished, either through seduction, inducement, or their dislike for Rwanda’s model. They appear to have taken sides, effectively making them party to the conflict and can therefore not be honest brokers. Will the pressure piling on Rwanda end the war in eastern DR Congo? It is unlikely. For several reasons. First, these resolutions, summons, sanctions, and other diplomatic pressure are silent on the root causes of the conflict, why M23 rebels chose to take up arms against their government. Even when they speak of a political settlement through dialogue, it comes at the end, as an afterthought. It has happened before. In 2013, M23 were ordered out of Goma which they had taken. They left and became refugees in Uganda and Rwanda. The causes of the conflict were never addressed and barely ten years later fighting resumed. That period was no more than a lull in the fighting. Second, the pressure is misplaced. It is being exerted in the wrong place and the wrong person. Rwanda is not the source of the conflict or instigator of the fighting. The DR Congo government and President Tshisekedi personally are responsible. President Kagame cannot be held responsible for the governance deficiency in DR Congo or the incompetence of its leaders. Even the M23 cannot be held responsible for the war. Their fight is a response to the DR Congo government’s discrimination, exclusion, attempts to depossess them of their nationality, and murder and destruction of their property. The pressure should be on Tshiseledi to make him take up his responsibility. He could end the war tomorrow if he wished. He can order the end to the discrimination and murder of Kinyarwanda-speaking Congolese and agree to talk to the M23 and address their legitimate grievances. The rebels have shown a willingness to talk from the very beginning. He could first also cut links with the FDLR, then disarm and repatriate them.. The west too can help if they put pressure on him to establish effective government presence in the whole territory of Congo. Then talk of territorial integrity and sovereignty would make sense Third, the DR Congo government cannot be trusted to respect the terms of these resolutions, except those that favour it. The M23 rebels will probably not withdraw because that would almost certainly lead to the extermination of the people whose rights they are fighting to defend. Fourth, any solution that does not take into account Rwanda’s security concerns is unrealistic. Rwanda faces an existential threat from inside the DR Congo - from the genocidal FDLR, now fighting alongside the Congolese army, and from President Tshisekedi who has said publicly that he will attack Rwanda and change its leadership. Yet the UN and Europeans want it to lower its defences. Clearly the west’s intention is not to find a solution to the problem, but to distract attention from the real issues. It is to prolong the conflict, not to end it. It is to maintain the disorder, disable state authority so that they can continue their exploitation of its resources unhindered. l Which explains why the west is reluctant to put the pressure where it should be, where it would yield positive results. The man and his government have committed sins for which the international community would have crucified any other person. They have not got as much as a gentle slap on the knuckles. The DR Congo has the most shambolic politics in the region. The state is shockingly absent in much of the country. They cannot protect their citizens against armed violence, dislocation and even murder. Indeed, they sometimes participate in these sins. They cannot even protect their much touted mineral resources from plunder by the same people now calling for the crucifixion of Rwanda. Or use them to develop their country. As a result of these governance and personal deficiencies, they blame their shortcomings on outsiders but also expect salvation from outside. The DR Congo government has declared some of its own citizens aliens and then gone on to fight them. In this strange enterprise, they have enlisted the support of the genocidal FDLR, a UN designated terrorist organisation, European mercenaries, a collection of local armed bands, Burundian government forces and troops from the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC). Even MONUSCO that was supposed to protect civilians and neutralise all negative forces in the region has for all intents and purposes been part of the Tshisekedi coalition. For close to thirty years successive Congolese authorities have facilitated this genocidal group to set up camps, rearm and mount attacks on Rwanda. Foreign embassies in Kinshasa, including those of the US, France, Belgium, Kenya , Uganda and Rwanda, were burned and vandalised following the fall of Goma to M23 rebels. Tshisekedi and his officials have threatened, publicly, to invade Rwanda and annex it. That was not an empty threat or the muttering of a mad man. He meant to carry it out and went on to amass troops and a huge arsenal of offensive weapons at the common border. He cannot deny this. The M23 seized these weapons and discovered war plans to attack Rwanda when they took Goma at the end of January. Indeed, his troops and their FDLR allies fired rockets into the border town of Rubavu and FDLR fighters attempted to cross into Rwanda. The rockets were intercepted and rendered harmless. As for the fighters who tried to enter the country, none is left to tell the story. And yet, for all these sins, Tshisekedi has not been lectured, reprimanded, threatened with dire consequences, or even urged to stop his excesses. Why this soft approach to Congolese issues? The minerals, of course. When they say that the conflict in eastern DRC is about minerals, they are right. Only they accuse the wrong people, Rwanda, for stealing Congo’s minerals. The West’s involvement in the Congo has centered on its natural resources – from its central role in triggering the Berlin Conference that partitioned Africa among European countries, King Leopold II’s personal rule of the territory, Belgian colonialism and Mobutu’s kleptocratic reign to the present. Recent press reports say that Tshisekedi wants to grant the US and Europe access to DR Congo’s vast mineral resources if they help him to end the war on his terms. When the current fighting was still far from the big mining centres, there was little condemnation of it beyond feeble concerns about displacement of the local population. But when it reached Rubaya where Belgians have important mining interests, the condemnations became louder and more menacing. You started hearing orders for the M23 to withdraw. Here is the hypocrisy. For nearly thirty years, FDLR have been in Rubaya, working the mines, apparently for Belgians. Not a word about the FDLR. Then there is the Cold War logic. DR Congo is awash with strategic minerals so essential in this digital and clean energy age. All the big powers want them, but they also want to exclude others, even from among their number. In the past, Mobutu’s sins were overlooked because he was useful in keeping the Soviets out of Congo. Very little seems to have changed. The same logic applies today – keep the Chinese and Russians from Congo’s minerals. But in doing this, they prolong the war and the Congolese and neighbours continue to suffer. Rwanda continues to take the blame for their greed.
