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Goma capture sparks fears of deeper regional conflict as Rwanda-backed rebels push south

“I’m aware of the risk of sounding alarmist, but we do have the elements here of a very nasty escalation.”

Members of the M23 rebel group are pictured as they supervise potential new recruits after seizing the city of Goma, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s North Kivu province. Arlette Bashizi/Reuters
Members of the M23 rebel group supervise potential new recruits after seizing the city of Goma, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s North Kivu province.

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The capture this week of Goma, the largest city in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo by M23 rebels and Rwandan troops has triggered a humanitarian and diplomatic crisis that risks expanding into an even deeper regional conflict.

The city of around two million was crammed with people seeking shelter as the fighting neared. Another 800,000 were in displacement camps in and around Goma and are scattering into a countryside where abuse by armed groups is rife.

There is little water, or electricity, and aid warehouses have been looted by the desperate. The fortunate are those that stockpiled food in advance, while everyone else has to deal with shuttered markets and rocketing prices at the few stalls that remain open.

The assault on Goma came as a surprise, some residents say. There was faith that 300-odd Romanian and French mercenaries would defend the city – hired to bolster a demoralised national army known as FARDC and their militia allies.

There was also international support from Southern African soldiers – deployed under a regional mission known as SAMIDRC – and UN MONUSCO peacekeepers. And yet the city fell.

The game-changer has been the 3,000 to 4,000 Rwandan troops, many of them special forces, who have been fighting alongside the M23, according to the latest reports from the UN’s group of experts monitoring DRC. Kigali has also supplied advanced military hardware, including anti-aircraft missiles and drone jammers that have neutralised both DRC’s small air force and MONUSCO surveillance.

This is a map of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The northwestern provinces of Ituri, North Kivu, and South Kivu are highlighted in red. The capital, Kinshasa, is also marked with a locator dot.

The M23 and Rwandan forces are not stopping at Goma. They are moving rapidly southwest towards Bukavu, the capital of South Kivu province, which is held by a mixed force of FARDC and militia auxiliaries known as Wazalendo (meaning ‘patriots’). Its fall would cement the government’s loss of eastern DRC.

The humanitarian fallout of the violence has been immense – and stands to worsen. “Safe humanitarian corridors must be opened to ensure the delivery of aid, including emergency food assessment, food assistance and the free movement of civilians fleeing the fighting,” Cynthia Jones, the World Food Programme’s country director told a press briefing this week.

Yet the current political mood is bellicose. In a national address, DRC President Félix Tshisekedi vowed to restore government authority in the Kivus, promising a “vigorous and coordinated response” against what he called “terrorists”. 

The tensions were also exemplified by a spat on X between Rwandan President Paul Kagame and his South African counterpart, Cyril Ramaphosa, who has been trying to manage the political fallout of the 14 soldiers his country lost defending Goma.

“If South Africa prefers confrontation, Rwanda will deal with the matter in that context any day,” Kagame posted.

Civilians draw water from Lake Kivu after the town was taken by M23 rebels, in Goma, North Kivu in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, January 30, 2025.
Arlette Bashizi/Reuters
Goma residents take jerry cans to Lake Kivu after the town was seized by M23 rebels, cutting off water and electricity.

Diplomatic conundrum 

The region is split over how to handle this crisis. The fear is that expanding direct confrontation between Rwanda and DRC could lead to a wider conflagration, pulling in even more neighbouring countries, as happened during the 1990s and early 2000s.

“I’m aware of the risk of sounding alarmist, but we do have the elements here of a very nasty escalation,” Richard Moncrieff of the International Crisis Group told The New Humanitarian. “We have a fragile DRC, a fragile Burundi, and a very, very aggressive Kagame – the African diplomatic arena is also deeply fractured.”

Kenyan President William Ruto, the East African Community (EAC) chair, convened a virtual summit on 29 January to discuss the worsening security situation – which Tshisekedi skipped. In his absence, the summit “strongly urged” him to engage directly in talks with the M23.

The language was a diplomatic setback for Tshisekedi. He has refused to talk directly to the M23, denying they have political legitimacy, characterising them instead as Rwandan “stooges”.

It’s a view held by many Congolese, some of whom trashed the embassies of Uganda, Kenya, France, Belgium, and the United States in Kinshasa this week, accusing their governments of either supporting the M23, or failing to pressure Rwanda to withdraw.

Tshisekedi has the weakest of hands to play. His haphazardly paid, poorly equipped, and disastrously led army has proven no match for the M23 and the Rwandans. And yet, in acquiescing to talks with the M23, “he will lose all political capital”, Daniel van Dalen of South African-based security firm, Signal Risk, told The New Humanitarian.

Two core issues

At the core of the crisis are two interlinked strategic issues: Rwanda’s political and security concerns; and the territorial integrity – and governance – of DRC.

Parallel diplomatic tracks have been created to resolve the conundrum. One is under the EAC, and is focussed on domestic political dialogue. The other, the Luanda process, is mandated by the African Union to mediate between DRC and Rwanda.

Eastern DRC is the base of scores of rebel movements, including the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), originally created by Hutus who fled there after participating in the Genocide against mainly Tutsis in 1994. Kigali demands their “neutralisation” – language accepted by regional leaders, despite the rights implications.

The twin goals of the Luanda process, led by Angolan President João Lourenço, is both the suppression of the FDLR and the disengagement of the Rwandan army. The problem has been with the sequencing.

Rwanda argues that clearing out the FDLR must come before it removes its “defensive measures” – its euphemism for troops on the ground. The Angolans and Congolese believe that the two processes should be launched simultaneously. 

Kagame snubbed a meeting with Tshisekedi in Luanda scheduled for 15 December. He said Kinshasa’s refusal to hold direct talks with the M23 made the meeting pointless, while Kinshasa accused Rwanda of introducing direct dialogue with the M23 a “last-minute condition”.

As diplomacy faltered last year, the M23 and Rwandan forces made further advances – including taking over the Rubaya coltan mines, the country’s largest. Between November 2023 and August 2024, the M23 expanded the area under its control by more than 70%, according to the latest UN experts report.

Kagame seems to have shut his door to the Luanda process. That has exacerbated the diplomatic rift in the region between the EAC’s far more conciliatory approach, and southern African states – led by South Africa – who are more bullish over Rwanda’s demands.

Ruto, and senior political figures in Uganda, are regarded as close to Kigali (Kampala is accused of directly supporting the M23). An East African force deployed in DRC in 2022 to “enforce peace” was withdrawn at the demand of Tshisekedi, amid popular anger over their inaction. SAMIDRC has been far more offensive minded.

A convenient bogey man?

The FDLR are believed to number around 1,000 fighters, who pose little security threat to Rwanda. But their continued presence does underline the more problematic support they receive from senior elements within the FARDC.

Kigali argues that the emergence of the M23 has been a home-grown response by Congolese Tutsis to that collaboration, as well as a defensive measure against anti-Tutsi attacks by armed groups.

But the M23’s history is murkier. It first emerged in 2012 following a mutiny by mainly Rwandophone FARDC officers in North and South Kivu. Its capture of Goma that year triggered international action, including the creation of a muscular UN Force Intervention Brigade and the suspension of over $200 million in aid to Rwanda – measures that led to the M23’s disbandment a year later.

Rwanda justifies the M23 as a response to the very real victimisation Congolese Tutsis have faced. But the evidence suggests Rwanda may have reversed the order of events. It was the surfacing of the M23 that deepened identity-based violence and resulted in the collaboration between the FDLR and a perpetually out-fought FARDC.

Kagame is scathing over the narrative that the FDLR are just a convenient bogeyman. “Some people, who don’t know what they’re talking about, say the FDLR is just a handful and that we’re exaggerating,” Kagame said in an interview with Jeaune Afrique. “But even if they’re few, why do they still exist after all these years?”

Jason Stearns, chair of the advisory board of the Congo Research Group, says amping up the FDLR danger is politically advantageous for Kagame. “It’s easier to run an authoritarian government and manage dissent if there is an imminent threat,” he told the BBC. “Especially if that imminent threat is to do with the genocide, which really is a foundational element within Rwandan society.”

M23’s murky history

The M23 is one more iteration in long-standing Rwandan support for rebel groups in the east that Kigali uses not only as a security screen, but to also maintain its political and economic interests in the region.

The M23’s re-emergence in North Kivu in late 2021 coincided with a period of Kigali’s perceived regional isolation. Tensions were high in particular with Uganda, which was building roads to link North Kivu to Ituri and on to Kampala, protected by Ugandan troops, which would bypass Rwanda -- cutting it out of some of the trade in Congo's rare minerals.

Rwanda's exploitation of DRC's resources has been detailed in multiple UN reports, the upshot being that Kigali exports more minerals than it mines. Gold and coltan typically smuggled in from eastern DRC is mixed with local production, contaminating global supply chains.

The tragedy of the DRC is a colonial history – and a political system – that has robbed the state and its citizens of the ability to benefit from those riches.

“External economic interests are part and parcel of the dynamics in eastern DRC,” said Solomon Dersso, director of Amani Africa, an Addis Ababa-based pan-African think tank.

“What’s happening can’t be blamed totally on Rwanda. The fragilities of the state, and state institutions, has created this crisis that’s been unfolding for decades,” he told The New Humanitarian. 

The M23 is now entrenching itself in the areas it controls. It is issuing official documents, levying taxes, and setting up formal administrative systems.

It has also made alliances with smaller armed movements under the banner of the Alliance Fleuve Congo (AFC) – increasingly referred to as its political wing – and presents itself as a national movement, whose ultimate goal is to reach Kinshasa.

“The question is, does the fall of Goma create a snowball effect, with smaller anti-government groups drawn to the M23 by the force of gravity,” said Moncrieff.

An absence of consequences

Rwanda’s policy, although hard to discern, is akin to building facts on the ground which will be hard to uproot. Russia in Ukraine, and Israel in Gaza, seem useful parallels for how international aggression can lead to long-term occupation.

It has so far escaped serious censure. Instead, Kigali is seen as a valuable security ally by Western governments and some African states. It is not only a significant contributor to UN peacekeeping efforts, it has bilateral defence arrangements with Mozambique, the Central African Republic, and Benin.

Its deployment of troops to Mozambique’s northern Cabo Delgado province to protect French company Total’s multi-billion dollar gas project against so-called Islamic State insurgents, is largely paid for by the European Union. Brussels has avoided attaching any conditions to that money.

Rwanda also has soft power. The football teams Arsenal and Paris Saint-Germain wear the country’s advertising on their jersey sleeves; it is often hailed as a beacon of efficiency and economic development in a struggling region; and Kigali was assiduously wooed by the last British government as part of its failed asylum-seeker deportation plan – despite the evidence of rights abuses.

The question is where leverage can come from to try and settle the crisis in DRC, before all the ingredients coalesce for a repeat of the stunningly destructive wars of the 1990s and early 2000s.

“Western governments are not exercising the influence they have,” said Montcrieff. “Diplomats say that even if they withheld aid, it wouldn’t change Kagame’s behaviour. But they haven’t tried it. There needs to be absolute maximum pressure on Kigali.”

For Dersso, there are two parallel and deep-seated problems to overcome.

“There is a national political consensus and nation building process that needs to be developed, including the question of resolving identity issues,” he said. “Then there’s the exogenous dimension of sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

With additional reporting by Fidel Kitsa in Goma. Edited by Philip Kleinfeld.

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