Kigali faces long-term security threats

According to a Rwanda security overview by the London-based research group Oxford Analytica, the security threat to Kigali posed by Hutu rebels has currently receded but remains a challenge in the longer term. The report, released yesterday, said the ex-FAR and Interahamwe have received a “battering” in northwest Rwanda and Kivu, but given the retraining and rearming of opposition groups in the DRC, Kigali’s future security cannot be guaranteed. It suggests the integration of opposition militia within the DRC army, notably the Parti armee pour la liberation du rwanda led by Juvenal Habyarimana’s former foreign minister Casimir Bizimungu, “provides a serious obstacle for the Rwandan leadership to enter a meaningful ceasefire” in the DRC conflict.

Kigali is “unlikely to believe that Kabila’s allied forces will be able to command and control the ex-FAR and Interahamwe if a ceasefire, troop standstill and a termination of hostilities were agreed.” Rwanda would need to ensure “it continues to receive the support of Uganda, South Africa and the United States to ensure its security,” the report adds.