Category World News

More than three decades after the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda plunged the African Great Lakes region into unprecedented turmoil, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) continue to struggle in establishing collaborative and neighbourly relations for the collective benefit of their peoples.

Following the genocide, in which approximately 800,000 people were killed in just 100 days, hundreds of thousands of Rwandans – including some members of the defeated Rwandan armed forces and militias responsible for the genocide – crossed into the DRC and settled in refugee camps in the country’s east, close to the Rwanda border. This became a security concern for the new government in Rwanda. The eastern DRC has not seen peace since.

In 1996, the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire (AFDL), a coalition of Rwandan, Ugandan, Burundian, and some Congolese dissidents, launched a war against the government of Zaire. The AFDL, primarily a Congolese movement against the Zaire leadership but receiving significant support from the governments of Rwanda and Uganda, ousted President Mobutu Sese Seko and brought Laurent-Desire Kabila to power. However, this change in government and the brutal dismantling of Hutu refugee camps that accompanied it did not usher in meaningful intra-governmental collaboration or an end to Rwanda’s security concerns.

Over the subsequent decades, Rwanda’s government continued to monitor the perpetual conflict in the eastern DRC, citing concerns about dissidents based there. According to United Nations reports, since 2012, this involvement has included direct support for the M23 rebel group waging an uprising against the DRC government.

In January 2025, following numerous UN reports confirming Rwanda’s support for M23, the DRC government severed diplomatic ties with Rwanda. Subsequently, Rwanda’s development partners imposed sanctions on the country, some of its officials, and the Gasabo Gold Refinery, requesting Rwanda to halt support for M23 immediately and withdraw its troops from DRC territory.

For the benefit of Rwanda, the DRC, and the entire region, the conflict in the eastern DRC and the decades-old tensions between the two neighbouring governments need to come to an end.

As someone deeply invested in delivering democracy and development to all Rwandans, I have long called on the Rwandan government to engage in positive diplomacy to resolve its differences with the DRC government. Rwanda must engage in such diplomacy to overcome its structural constraints to development as a small, landlocked country with limited natural resources.

If it resolves its issues with its neighbour, Rwanda could finally achieve true regional integration, participate in lucrative regional supply chains, and become a dependable partner to the wider international community.

The peace deal the United States is currently attempting to broker between Rwanda and the DRC could put Kigali on the path to achieving all these gains.

However, certain conditions are necessary for any peace deal between the DRC and Rwanda to be effective.

As many have suggested, I agree that only a peace deal supported by a bilateral mineral cooperation incentive, guaranteed by a global power like the US – which would help control competition for natural resources – has a chance of succeeding. After all, there is little doubt that illicit trading of minerals has been used to finance the conflict in the eastern DRC. Yet this dark trade is not the fundamental cause of the conflict, and its cessation alone cannot resolve the issues between the two neighbours.

The root cause of the eastern DRC conflict is, in fact, a lack of good governance and robust democracy across the African Great Lakes region.

Lack of democracy, justice, and respect for human rights, coupled with social and economic exclusion, has caused Rwandans who survived the brutal dismantling of Hutu refugee camps not to return to Rwanda, and others to leave the country to seek refuge in regional states. Some Congolese have also made their way to Rwanda, escaping war, persecution and exclusion.

According to the most recent figures by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, there are still more than 200,000 Rwandan refugees in the DRC and close to 83,000 Congolese refugees in Rwanda. There are more Congolese refugees in other regional states, such as Uganda, which hosts more than 600,000 of them. Some of these refugees have been enrolled in armed groups.

All this has enabled power holders to abuse their authority and create chaos in the eastern DRC. While illicit trading of minerals has financed the conflict, the fundamental cause of the violence remains the lack of good governance and the inability or unwillingness of authorities to address the core concerns of refugees – the reasons why they sought refuge in either Rwanda or the DRC, and why they do not want to return to their countries of origin.

The US can help address this problem and bring sustainable calm to the region by including a condition in the peace deal it is currently brokering that requires the Rwandan and Congolese governments to engage in direct dialogue with their respective opposition – both within and outside their borders – as well as with refugees, and commit to achieving good governance based on political inclusiveness, respect for human rights, and the rule of law. This would enable the voluntary and dignified return of refugees to their countries of origin and could finally put an end to the decades of chaos in the eastern DRC.

Rwanda does not even need US pressure to embark on the path of positive diplomacy and dialogue, as a continuous quest for solutions through dialogue is one of the fundamental requirements of its constitution. The Rwandan opposition has already expressed its eagerness to enter into such constructive dialogue with the government. Four years ago, in June 2021, we submitted to the Rwandan government a roadmap for a promising future, officially requesting an inter-Rwandan dialogue to be organised.

Similar efforts are under way in the DRC. Opposition figures in the country have recently called for an inter-Congolese dialogue to resolve internal governance issues.

It is high time for Rwanda and the DRC to engage in dialogue with their respective refugees and opposition members, both within and outside their countries. This will ensure not only the long-term success of a Washington-brokered peace deal but also lead to trust-building between state officials on both sides and pave the way for true regional cooperation, which will help both nations prosper after finally achieving peace.

Tens of thousands of people came home to check on their homes and reunite with loved ones after Sudan’s army recaptured Khartoum, the country’s capital region, in March.

The shock of returning was tempered by the damage that had been done for nearly two years by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a paramilitary organization that has been fighting the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) since April 2023, which are widely recognized as Sudanese and the UN as the de facto authority there.

Many returnees started becoming sick in a region where the RSF had systematic plundernied hospitals and food and drug stores.

Omdurman falters

In Omdurman, one of the three cities in the country’s capital, where many of the returnees lived, there were only slightly better living conditions. Due to the RSF’s continued presence in several areas of Omdurman, preventing it from frequent clashes, pillaging, and looting, several of them never came under their control.

According to Dr. Dirar Abeer, a member of Khartoum’s Emergency Response Rooms, neighborhood committees spearheading relief efforts across the country, “thousands of people]return] from Egypt alone.”

According to Dr. Abeer, the crowding contributed to the rapid spread of cholera, a severe, highly contagious diarrhoeal disease that is endemic to Sudan and can be fatal if left untreated.

According to Badawi, a volunteer in Omdurman who declined to give his full name because speaking in a warzone is difficult, “There are a lot of corpses rotting next to]or in] the Nile, and this has partially] caused the spread of infection.”

In Sudan, hundreds have died in the past two weeks from cholera, which has spread throughout several states, including White Nile and Gadarif.

Similar to Khartoum, overcrowding and a lacked essential services in these areas contributed to the spread.

According to Fazli Kostan, the project manager for Doctors Without Borders, which is known by its French names as MSF, basic sanitation and provisions could stop the waterborne disease.

However, he claimed that this is not currently possible because Omdurman’s electricity grids went offline on May 14.

The RSF fired a number of suicide drones that day, which severely damaged major power plants and grids, shutting down water treatment plants, and causing a sharp rise in cases.

People have resorted to drinking contaminated water from the Nile and removing water from the ground after it rains because they lack safe drinking and bathing water, according to Badawi.

Between May 15 and May 25, according to the SAF-backed Ministry of Health, a significant rise in daily cholera deaths occurred in the national capital region, with at least 172 people passing away between May 20 and May 27.

According to the UN, daily cases increased from 90 to more than 815 in the latter half of May.

Patients waited patiently in the streets.

The disease-stricken person frequently flies to the closest hospital, putting strain on an already underdeveloped and underprepared health sector. Local volunteers, however, claimed that many people who don’t have life-threatening symptoms would benefit from staying at home and isolating themselves.

According to them, the overcrowding in hospitals has increased the spread of the disease and increased the strain on the already defunct healthcare system.

The rate of patients coming to the hospitals is much higher than we can handle, according to Kareem al-Noor, a doctor at Omdurman’s al-Nao hospital. “We do not have enough medication or medical tools.”

“The remaining hospitals are full, and people are also waiting for treatment, and there are crowded on the streets,” al-Noor continued.

Dr. Abeer believes that the health authorities, which are funded by SAF, are not adequately combating the epidemic. She believes the current health authorities could be doing more, despite the fact that the RSF had largely destroyed the sector.

Al Jazeera emailed Dr. Montasser Towarra, the spokesperson for the MoH, to inquire about the steps the ministry is taking to assist volunteers and provide basic necessities.

By the time this article was published, he had not responded.

The crisis is made worse by hunger.

A serious hunger crisis also exists in Sudan.

Millions of Sudanese have struggled to feed their families as a result of the civil war’s spoiled harvests, the systematic looting of markets, food aid, and the destruction of homes and livelihoods.

About 25 million people, or more than half the population, are currently experiencing severe food shortages, according to the UN.

According to Alex De Waal, an expert on Sudan and famine, hunger can weaken people’s bodies and cause an acute rise in contagious diseases.

He noted that people who are also near starvation have always been more likely to die from diseases, especially children.

De Waal warned that “we could see an excess of hundreds of thousands of deaths]resulting from these factors over the coming year.”

Up to one million children could perish from cholera unless the spread is stopped right away, according to the UN.

De Waal argued that the only way to address the health crisis is to repair basic infrastructures like water and sewers, which would improve sanitation.

He thinks that the army, which is essentially the ruling body, shouldn’t prioritize fixing the army’s fundamental services.

Nabil Abdullah, a spokesperson for the SAF, was contacted by Al Jazeera to inquire about whether the army plans to repair crucial resources like bombed electricity grids.

According to Abdullah, “The Ministry of Health is in charge of these inquiries, not the army.”

Additionally, the MoH’s Tawarra did not respond to these inquiries.

De Waal believes that the army prioritizes combat operations against the RSF.