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Many Congolese were hopeful that a permanent ceasefire would soon be established after Qatar assisted in signing a peace agreement last month to put an end to the conflict between the M23 rebel group and the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC) government.

Since late 2021, the group, which the United States and the United Nations say is backed by Rwanda, has clashed with the Congolese army in heavy offensives that have killed at least 7, 000 people&nbsp, this year alone. Regional resolution efforts have failed in various instances. Still, when M23 representatives and Congolese government officials met for negotiations in Doha and proceeded to sign a peace deal in November, exhausted Congolese dared to hope. Some believed that this deal could be different.

So when the rebels launched yet another offensive and temporarily seized the strategic city Uvira this month, hopes for lasting peace were painfully crushed, as some concluded that those at the helm of the talks were playing politics.

From the M23-held eastern city of Goma, Congolese lawyer and political analyst Hubert Masomera blaming both sides, “It’s obvious that they don’t have any will end this conflict.” “Despite the number of deaths and the extent of the destruction, there is still procrastination over the implementation of the peace agreements and compliance with the ceasefire. People in this place feel abandoned by their unhappy fate.

Fears that the conflict will not only continue, but that it could soon take on a regional dimension, are deepening, too – a sensitive prospect in a DRC where two civil wars in the past were prompted by its neighbours.

Following US pressure last week, the rebels’ withdrawal from the newly seized city of Uvira as a “trust-building measure” followed by a major transportation and economic hub in the enormous South Kivu province. It’s strategically located on the border with Rwanda and is just 30 kilometres from the Burundian capital, Bujumbura. The city was the last of the Congolese army’s eastern allies, which included local “Wazalendo” militias and about 3, 000 Burundian soldiers. Early this year, M23 also seized control of South Kivu’s capital city, Bukavu, as well as Goma, the capital of North Kivu province.

According to experts, M23’s advance on Uvira significantly widens the group’s area of control, places it directly in the mineral-rich Katanga region, and places Rwandan proxies directly on Burundi’s doorstep as both governments launch a rhetorical war of words and accuse one another of supporting rebels.

Rwanda, for its part, continues to distance itself from accusations that it backs M23.

DRC conflict’s complex history

According to conflict monitors, the recent events in eastern DRC appear to be a haunting playback of a tragic story.

Similar peace negotiations in late 2024, led by the African Union and Angola, seemed ready to deliver peace ahead of a new year. However, they fell apart after the presidents of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo called off a highly anticipated meeting. Both sides&nbsp, accused each other of foiling the talks.

According to Nicodemus Minde, an analyst for East Africa at the Institute for Security Studies (ISS), “there’s a sense of deja vu.” “It’s symbolic because we were exactly here last year … the prospects for peace are dire”.

A complex combination of ethnic grievances, subpar governance, and interference from its much smaller neighbours has long sparked conflict in the DRC. It goes back to the 1994 genocide of Tutsis and moderate Hutus in Rwanda, which displaced millions into neighbouring eastern DRC, making them a minority there. However, Rwanda’s hot pursuit of the Hutu genocidaires led to the first and second Congo wars (1996-2003), and it has since since seen the DRC as a hiding place for them. The UN also accused the Rwandan and allied Ugandan forces of looting the DRC’s vast mineral wealth, including gold, coltan and tin, during the conflict.

In the wars, many of which are still active in the DRC, hundreds of militias emerged as governments armed and counter-armed civilians. The M23 itself is only the latest iteration of a Tutsi militia that fought in the Congo wars, and whose fighters integrated into the DRC army. These fighters revolted in 2012 and complained of Congolese forces’ poor treatment. Now, the M23 claims to be fighting the marginalisation of ethnic Tutsis, some of whom say they are systematically denied citizenship, among other complaints. Despite members of the group’s frequent threats to advance on the capital, the M23 and its allies, the Congo River Alliance (AFC), have not stated their intentions to invade Kinshasa. Officially, the rebels claim to be “liberating” eastern DRC communities.

M23 initially emerged with sufficient force to seize Goma, but Congolese forces and a special UN intervention force made up of troops from South Africa, Tanzania, and Malawi forced them to retreat within a year. When the M23 resurfaced in late 2021, though, it was with much more ferocity, boosted by about 4, 000 Rwandan troops in addition to its own 6, 000 fighters, according to the UN. Since its light-ning, bloody offensives, which have included the major cities of Goma, Bukavu, and now, Uvira, have been under its control.

On the map, M23 appears to be eking out a slice of Congolese territory wedged between the DRC and neighbouring Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi. If it had complete control of the two Kivus, it would rule over a resource-rich, five-fold-the-size Rwandan region with easy access to Kigali and Kampala.

“They are trying to create some sort of buffer zone which the neighbouring countries, particularly Rwanda but also Uganda, have an interest in controlling”, analyst Paul-Simon Handy, also of the ISS, told Al Jazeera.

Despite being accused of supporting a Hutu rebel group, the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), Kigali officially denies backing M23 and uses its justification to support its actions. The FDLR did exist for many years in the DRC, but it simply no longer poses a significant threat to Kigali, analyst Minde said.

Similar historical ties exist between Rwanda and Burundi, where the Hutus who carried out the 1994 genocide also emigrated, and where Kigali claims the government continues to support rebels. In 2015, Burundi accused Rwanda of sponsoring an abortive coup in Bujumbura. Kigali refutes this.

Is there a chance the US deal will go through?

Several African countries have attempted to help solve the crisis, militarily and diplomatically, but all have failed. As part of the Kenyan-led Peace Process that was supposed to bring several rebel groups to an agreement, the East African Community, which includes the DRC, deployed about 6, 500 peacekeepers as part of the regional bloc’s efforts to stabilize eastern DRC. The agreement collapsed only a year later, however, after Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi grew frustrated over the force’s refusal to launch offensives against M23.

Then, in May 2023, the Southern African Development Community (SADC), to which the large DRC is a part, sent troops from South Africa, Tanzania, and Malawi. There was hope that the trio, which proved crucial in driving back the first M23 insurrection, would again record success. However, they withdrew this June because they didn’t seem to be up to par with the new M23.

Meanwhile, the Angola-led Luanda Peace Process collapsed after President Joao Lourenco stepped back in March, citing frustration with both sides amid constant finger-pointing.

In June of this year, Qatar and the US intervened by using a unique two-pronged strategy to broker peace. The Doha peace talks, on the one hand, have focused on negotiations between the DRC and M23, while the Washington talks focus on the DRC and the Rwanda governments. According to some experts, Washington’s motivation was a condition of the agreement that guarantees US extraction of rare earth minerals from both nations, aside from President Donald Trump’s fixation on being a global peacemaker figure. The agreement was unlikely to hold on that basis, rights groups said.

The M23 finally accepted the Doha framework&nbsp on November 15 after a few stumbling blocks and stumblings. The agreement includes eight implementation protocols, including one on ceasefire monitoring and another on prisoner exchange. As all three agreed to the US-peace agreement, which forbids both Rwanda and the DRC from supporting armed groups, President Trump sat next to Paul Kagame and Tshisekedi as they signed it in Washington on December 4. There were pockets of fighting as the signatures were penned, but all was supposed to be largely peaceful from then on.

The opposite was the reality of what transpired in Uvira just one week later. The Congolese government said at least 400 people were killed and 200, 000 others displaced as M23 fighters pressed on the city. Burundi, where 200 000 Congolese refugees are currently residing, had displaced thousands of people there. Fleeing Uvira residents shared accounts of bombed villages, summary killings and widespread sexual violence by both sides, according to medical group Doctors Without Borders (MSF).

Exists a chance for peace?

Even though M23 began withdrawing from Uvira on Thursday, analysts are still scrambling to understand what the group was hoping to achieve by taking the city, shattering the peace agreements and angering Washington.

After Uvira was captured, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio directly criticized Rwanda, claiming Kigali had broken the deal. Last week, Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau met with DRC Foreign Minister Therese Kayikwamba Wagner in Washington and promised that the US “is prepared to take action to enforce adherence” from Rwanda.

What exactly will happen is a mystery, but Minde claimed that the agreement seemed to favor Kigali more than Kinshasa.

“If you look at the agreement, the consequences]of either party breaching] were not forthright, and this points to the weakness of the deal”, he said, adding that there is much more at stake for DRC if there is a breach, including escalating conflict and mass displacement within the country. The analyst explained that, however, was not taken into account.

Uvira’s fall, albeit on hold, is not only a blow to Trump’s peacemaker reputation but also sharpens tensions between Burundi and Rwanda, with analysts saying it could lead to direct clashes.

Rwanda and the rebels deny the accusations made by Bujumbura that Kigali supports the anti-government Red Tabara rebels, and tensions between the two governments have caused border closures since last year. Last week, M23 announced that it captured hundreds of Burundian soldiers during the Uvira offensive.

The UN Security Council decided to extend the MONUSCO peacekeeping mission’s mandate by a year in advance of its December 20 expiration due to concerns about a regional spillover. The 11, 000 troop force has been in place since 1999, but has a complicated relationship with the DRC government, which says it has not done enough to protect civilians. In response to the M23 offensive’s escalating expansion, UNO forces initially began pulling back in 2024 before putting a stop to it in July. Ituri, the force’s headquarters, is held by M23, meaning the troops are unable to do much.

According to analysts, the Congolese people are feeling the most depressed at the start of the year amid the chaos, finger-pointing, and political games. After more than three decades of war that has turned the green, undulating hills of eastern DRC into a perpetual battlefield, Masameko in Goma said it’s locals, more than anyone else, with the most at stake.

When the Darfur conflict started in 2003, I was about 13 years old. Before the emergence of social media, I was a teenager who read and listened to the news, but I now fully comprehended the historical or political context. a need to end a humanitarian crisis One of the events that ultimately led to my career as a doctor and working in conflict and natural disasters.

In al-Dabba, in Sudan’s Northern State, I volunteered with an NGO that provided medical care for internally displaced people (IDP) during the first two weeks of December. In some ways, I have turned my attention to the beginning, to the moment when I first started acting.

The camp’s population increased from 2, 000 to more than 10, 000 over the course of the two weeks we spent there. There were times when it seemed like there would never be enough resources to accommodate everyone. Not enough water and food. Not enough medication. Not enough latrines are available.

Instead, I repeatedly witnessed the Sudanese people’s courage, generosity, and selflessness, from the IDPs themselves to the local NGO staff I was volunteering with.

Some of the people I met while spending a day at the camp have these tales.

Fatima, 15, is popular among people. She had traveled to al-Dabba in 21 days. She fled as the Rapid Support Forces, a militia that is currently battling the Sudanese army, advanced upon her hometown.

She gave birth to her first child at 10 weeks. She required a hospital transfer for a fetal ultrasound. I politely inquired if the child’s father would accompany her to the hospital. She turned her head away. I was informed by her mother that she had been raped. I placed Fatima’s hand in hers, and we sat silently there, her tears slipping down my sleeves.

Then, I ran into Aisha, a five-year mother. On the difficult but exhausting journey from El-Fasher to al-Dabba, she lost her husband. I informed her that she would need to be transferred to the hospital where she would receive a blood transfusion because her hemoglobin was so low. After losing their father, she couldn’t bear to leave her children, who were repeatedly having nightmares and not sleeping well at night.

We resolved to let the children stay with their grandma while Aisha was transferred to the hospital after trying to solve problems with her for the better part of an hour.

Khadija followed. She had to travel to al-Dabba for four weeks. She witnessed her husband being shot in the back while he was attempting to flee El-Fasher. She carried on with her three young children, fleeing on foot, as it was heartbreaking to leave without giving him a proper burial.

There was little food and potable water on the way. Her eldest child, who was malnourished and severely diarrhoea, was also fatal. She managed to snag the money to travel for a portion of the way with her two other children while trying to cobble together the money.

However, another tragedy struck. They were involved in a motor vehicle collision. Her injuries caused the death of her second child. Khadija brought her only son, who was the only one still living, to al-Dabba with her.

Khadija had her fourth child at 36 weeks pregnant when we first met in our medical tent. I prescribed her a course of antibiotics because she had an infection in her urinary system. She generously kissed both of my cheeks and thanked me profusely. I felt even more embarrassed when she expressed her gratitude for everything she had to offer a person who had endured great hardship. She was being kept in my prayers, I told her.

She suddenly asked me my name as she approached me. She kept repeating my name after I gave it to her, letting it gently fall off her tongue. Then she said, “This is what I will call my child,” and then pointed to her pregnant belly. When she had already taken so much from me, I was overwhelmed by what she was giving me.

I once needed to take a break for Auntie Najwa’s thatched straw home because I needed to pray at noon. She had spent more than a year interning at the IDP camp. One of her few possessions was her prayer mat. However, she gave it to anyone who needed it. Her home sounded like a secure haven. I was told to drink tea, but she refused. She graciously offered me cooked lentils and beans when I declined politely. I was left humbled by her generosity.

And Ahmed, my translator, had the same level of courage. He was a member of the neighborhood staff at the nonprofit where I was volunteering. Ahmed traveled to Egypt with his parents and siblings at the start of the war in 2023, made sure they were safe, and then went back to Sudan to serve his people. This is a story I’ve heard before and always.

Despite numerous threats to their own personal safety, the local team in Sudan had made countless sacrifices to remain there and serve its citizens. I can only imagine how worried and worried my own father is when he dropped me off at the airport before my scheduled trip to Sudan, knowing that Ahmed’s parents choose to keep their son in a warzone and live in relative safety.

The world’s biggest humanitarian crisis is occurring in Sudan. It has only received 35% of its global funding needs, or less. One-third of the population has been relocated, according to wikipedia. One in two people is hungry. Millions of people are famine-prone in many areas of the nation.

I’m not sure what the solutions are. However, I am aware that the international community has repeatedly failed Sudan and its people.

Better is possible. Better work is required.

Better is due to Fatima, Khadija, Aisha, Auntie Najwa, and Ahmed.

The people of Sudan deserve much better.

*Names have been changed to protect their identities in all cases.

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