The right to territorial integrity is the basis for international peace and security. In the case of the ongoing security crisis in eastern DRC, for which the Congolese Government is unjustly blaming Rwanda, the fact that territorial integrity goes both ways seems to be lost.
For almost 35 years the DR Congo (and Zaire) has consistently violated Rwanda’s territorial integrity, the made itself out to be the victim when Rwanda reacts to the provocations.
As far back as 1996, Mobutu Sese Seko, the then president of Zaire complained that Rwanda was destabilizing his country with the aim of annexing parts of it. The reality was very different. Since 1990, Zaire/the DRC, has been a source of instability for Rwanda.
In October 1990, when the forces of the Rwanda Patriotic Army (RPA) launched their liberation struggle by entering Kagitumba, the Rwandan government of the time sought help from Zaire. The Zairean Armed Forces (FAZ), got involved in the Rwandan conflict on the side of President Juvenal Habyarimana’s genocidal army.
The 1,400 Zairean troops that joined the French and FAR (Forces Armées Rwandaises) to fight against the RPA quickly became notorious for their human rights violations and acts of banditry.
In a confidential report sent back to Paris by Colonel René Galinié, the French Embassy defence attaché, he noted that the FAZ troops were not only stealing people’s belongings at checkpoints they had set up, they were also raping women.
At the time Zairian officials, including military chiefs, played a key role both in supplying arms and facilitating arms flows to the FAR, even after the international community imposed an arms embargo against Rwanda while the Genocide against the Tutsi was underway on May 17, 1994.
Cargo flights brought weapons into the Goma airport, which were then delivered to the FAR in Gisenyi. In one incident, two Air Zaire planes, flew anti-tank and fragmentation grenades, as well as high-calibre ammunition, to Goma from the Seychelles on the nights of June 16-17 and 18-19, 1994. These weapons were then transferred to the FAR in Gisenyi, and were used by FAR in the genocide effort.
Following the defeat of the genocidal government in 1994, the FAR and Interahamwe militias who killed over a million Rwandans, along with millions of Rwandan civilians fled to Zaire, settling in refugee camps right by the Rwandan border around the areas of Goma, Mugunga, Kibumba, Kahindo, Katale, Kabira, Karehe, Bukavu, Nyamirangue, Chimengue. This was an outright violation of UNHCR regulations that stated that refugee camps had to be located 50km from international borders.
Instead of disarming the heavily armed genocidal forces, as Tanzanian authorities had rightly done for those who fled across the eastern border, Zaire allowed the defeated Rwandan forces to keep their arms in the refugee camps. In fact, the Zairean government gave land in North Kivu to the former government of Rwanda to serve as the military headquarters for the presidential guard and other uniformed military units. The camp created there was known as ‘Lac Vert’.
As a UN Commission of Inquiry revealed, ex-FAR/Interahamwe received arms from South Africa and Europe with the complicity of Zairean authorities. Ex-FAR leaders, including Augustin Bizimungu, travelled around the region on Zairean passports organizing the arms shipments.
As a result of this support by the Zairean government, by 1995 these genocidal forces were crossing over the border to fight and sabotage the new Rwandan government forces in Rwanda, and terrorize civilians trying to rebuild their lives. On 29 October 1996 Zairean troops shelled Cyangugu (now Rusizi) killing several civilians and wounding others. As a result of these attacks, the new Rwandan leadership chose to defend the country as well as launch an offensive and, as part of a large coalition, removed President Mobutu.
Since then, cross-border attacks have continued unabated. In 2012, Rwanda recorded nine incidents resulting directly from FARDC (Forces Armées de la RDC) action. For example, on August 29, a bomb landed in a marketplace in Mbugangari in Rubavu town killing a woman, Vestine Mukagasana and seriously injuring her two-month-old son. On the same day a second bomb landed near the Grand Barriere in Rubavu town, injuring one person; and eight bombs landed at Busasamana village in Rubavu.
In an attack that killed 8 people and wounded 18 others on 5 October 2019, genocidal militia FDLR/RUD Urunana attacked the Rwandan tourist area of Kinigi from DRC while on 23 May 2022, FARDC (working alongside FDLR) kidnapped two Rwandan soldiers on border patrol duty. On 17 June 2022, a FARDC soldier entered Rwandan territory and fired several bullets before being shot dead 25 meters inside Rwandan territory. His body was handed over to FARDC the same day.
Early this year, on 24 January, RDF was forced to take defensive measures after an FARDC Sukhoi-25 fighter jet violated Rwanda’s airspace – the third time that such a provocation occurred in a space of just three months.
FARDC has not only attacked Rwandan positions, there is concrete evidence that FDLR is embedded in its structure. FDLR attempts to export terror and instability into Rwanda will never be tolerated and will always be repelled.
Instead of playing the victim, the DRC needs to take responsibility for its own actions. For over two decades the DR Congo has hosted not only FDLR and other groups fighting against the Rwandan Government, it has hosted rebel groups from Burundi and Uganda. Rwanda, and the rest of the region, has never been the cause of Congolese instability. Rather it is the poor leadership and the abandonment of any form of governance that have brought the DRC to where it is today.
Unless these fundamental challenges are recognised and then tackled in a sober manner, it’s hard to imagine stability in Eastern DRC. It should be expected that Rwanda, and the rest of the region, will always be forced to guard against the resulting insecurity and threats of attack.