Rwanda disputes claims that its forces are supporting the M23 militia’s attack on Goma, the capital of the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, which has advanced on a new front and taken control of two districts in the province of South Kivu.
While denying Rwandan troops were engaged, Rwanda, which supports M23 rebels who took over Goma in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) this week, has called for a truce throughout the eastern DRC and for Kinshasa to engage in talks with the rebels.
Fighting will stop in Goma proper as the rebels now control it, Rwandan Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe told the Reuters news agency over the phone on Wednesday. Looting and intermittent shooting persisted on Wednesday, according to residents of Goma.
“But Rwanda supports that there be a ceasefire in the whole region (of eastern Congo) and that there be a dialogue, which we have been requesting for a long time between the DRC and M23,” he stated.
Rwandan military assisted M23 rebels in capturing Goma, the largest city in eastern Congo, on Monday, according to the DRC, which claims Rwanda supports M23.
Rwanda’s military claims that its activities are purely defensive and denies that its forces have crossed into the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Regarding what Kigali could or would do to guarantee a truce in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, Nduhungirehe remained silent.
In what seemed to be an effort to increase their sphere of influence, M23 rebels were on Wednesday heading south from Goma, the seat of North Kivu region, towards Bukavu, the capital of South Kivu province.
NduhungireHe claimed that Goma’s death made DRC President Felix Tshisekedi weaker and that he had no choice but to engage in talks with the rebels.
Nduhungirehe asserted that Rwanda has consistently rejected a military solution, saying, “Now that Goma has fallen, there needs to be a way out, and this is the only remaining option.”
The DRC won’t engage in direct talks with M23 since it views it as a terrorist organization. Therese Kayikwamba Wagner, the foreign minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, has urged the UN Security Council to impose sanctions on Rwanda for its backing of M23.
Following a collapse in peace negotiations between the DRC and Rwanda in mid-December, the rebels have been moving quickly through the mineral-rich east of the country since the beginning of the year.
Rwanda asserts that Rwandans who took part in the 1994 genocide fled to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), where the Congolese military has absorbed or assisted them, citing ethnic violence between Hutus and Tutsis as one of the reasons for ongoing war.
“Goma cannot serve as a goal unto itself.”
According to a local source and locals, the M23 encountered little opposition when capturing Kiniezire and Mukwidja in neighboring South Kivu on Wednesday morning.
According to a local civil society leader who spoke on condition of anonymity for security concerns, “there was no fighting” during the most recent push.
The AFP news agency confirmed the area’s seizure after speaking with a number of the two villages’ residents over the phone.
North and South Kivu, which are rich in precious metals, have been at the center of a battle involving numerous armed factions for more than 30 years.
The city of Kavumu, which includes an airfield, is the primary defensive line for the DRC’s military forces (FARDC) in South Kivu.
If the M23 breaches the FARDC defenses in Kavumu, it could also pose a threat to South Kivu’s capital, Bukavu.
The M23’s raids forced some of the DRC’s military stationed in Goma to flee the city by boat on Lake Kivu and seek safety in Bukavu.
A top Rwandan official told AFP on Wednesday that the M23 “will continue” in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo and even beyond.
“They will continue in South Kivu, because Goma cannot be an end in itself,” stated Vincent Karega, Rwanda’s traveling envoy to the Great Lakes.
On January 19, the M23 crossed into Kalehe territory and seized Lumbishi, a mining town 170 kilometers from Bukavu.
The rebel group took control of Minova, a commercial center that connects Goma and South Kivu province, two days later.
EAC and Angola call for negotiations
Later on Wednesday, the East African leaders asked the Kinshasa to begin direct talks with all parties involved, including the M23 rebels, and demanded an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo.
It was settled at a special East African Community (EAC) virtual summit that Kenya hosted and that Rwandan President Paul Kagame attended but Congolese President Tshisekedi did not.
As the EAC heads of state convened virtually to discuss the security situation in Goma, Tshisekedi instead took a plane to Angola to meet with his Angolan counterpart, Joao Lourenco.
Lourenco demanded an urgent meeting between Rwandan and M23 commanders in Luanda to discuss the violence and the “immediate withdrawal” of Rwandan forces and M23 rebels from the DRC.
According to a statement from his office, Lourenco “calls for the immediate withdrawal of the Rwanda Defence Forces from the Congolese territory” and the “convening of a tripartite summit in Luanda, on an urgent basis.”
Tshisekedi warned of the possibility of regional “escalation” in a televised speech on Wednesday, denouncing the “inaction” of the international community in the face of the escalating violence in the east.
The DRC may face “straight to an escalation” in the Great Lakes region as a result of the Rwanda-backed fighters’ progress in the country’s east, he claimed, adding that “your silence and inaction… are an affront” to the country.
He bemoaned the deteriorating security situation and stated that the army is in the midst of a “vigorous response” in the east.
Following the breakdown of the most recent peace negotiations mediated by Angola in December, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan last week extended an invitation to Türkiye to serve as a mediator between Kinshasa and Kigali.
