The entrance of the Rebelde Group Movement March 23 (M23) last Sunday in the Congolese city of rubber, the capital of Kivu Norte, in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo (RDC), is, for now, the last chapter of a long conflict. The dispute, which has its roots in the 1994 Rwandés genocide, nourishes the exploitation of Coltán’s mines. And has led Rwanda and Congo to the edge of a war. The crisis, in addition, hits a country from central Africa, Congo, which still feels the effects of the two great wars that between 1996 and 2003 ended the lives of more than five million people, including combatants and civilians who died in a way indirectly due to malnutrition and subsequent health problems.
What is the M23?
The M23, which is now presented under the framework of the Congo River Alliance (AFC, according to French), is the last expression of the tutsis armed groups that have been fought for three decades to the Hutus militias, which they accuse of the death of a million tutsis and Hutus moderate in Rwanda in 1994. On March 23, 2009, the Tutsis Congoleños rebels reached an agreement with the Kinshasa authorities for integration into the army, but the failure of said process made that three years later they became a guerrillas again. His name commemorates the date of the failed agreement.
In November 2012, the M23 already managed to take the rubber city (around two million inhabitants) and, just like now, Rwanda was behind the armed group. In a few months, the Guerrillas of majority Tutsi demonstrated the weakness of the Congolese armed forces and took control of the city. This occupation, which was accompanied by massacres, human rights violations and murders, according to the UN, lasted just 11 days. On December 3, the Congoleñas forces re -entered a gum to a peace agreement signed in neighboring Uganda.
When did the recent offensive begin?
After a decade of hibernation of the conflict, the rebellion was activated again in 2022 and since then it has been gaining ground to the Congolese armed forces, unable to stop an advance that intensified in early 2025 and has managed to arrive, again, until gum . The occupation of more and more territory has caused the progressive flight of up to 800,000 people who, at first, moved as displaced to the rubber city and that, in recent days, have moved again in their attempt to cross Towards Rwanda. At the same time, this advance has allowed M23 to control the Rubay Mining Region, where the valuable coltan is extracted with which mobile phones and technological products are manufactured.
Does Rwanda support the guerrillas?
Both the Congo government and the UN, the EU and the United States have accused Rwanda of being behind the M23, something that Kigali’s authorities deny. A United Nations report dated in mid -January pointed to the presence on Congolese soil between 2,000 and 3,000 Ruandese soldiers in support of the M23. A good part of the coltan and other minerals that are extracted from the guerrillas controlled by the guerrillas and from there and from there it is exported to the rest of the world, according to specialized organisms.
Rwanda’s support for M23 has tensioned relations between Kinshas He has confirmed, and has retired to all his diplomats from the Ruandesa capital. The Rwandan president, Paul Kagame, says, however, that Congolese support for the Militias Hutus is at the origin of the problem, and has also called his staff in Kinshasa. The United Nations Secretary General, António Guterres, fears an extension of the conflict in the African continent.
What are the possibility of signing peace?
The last attempt to reach a peace agreement crystallized in the process of Luanda (Angola), led by the Angoleño President, Joao Lourenço, who promoted a high fire failed in July 2024. On December 15, TSHISEKEDI and KAGAM Finding in Luanda, but, at the last minute, President Ruandés announced that he would not attend the meeting claiming Congo’s lack of commitment to negotiate with the M23.
What other forces participate in the conflict?
Born in 1999, the UN mission for the stabilization of Congo (Monusco), which last December had 11,000 soldiers on the ground, has also been involved in the fighting. Although their mandate is the protection of civilians and the stabilization of the supply routes, they have tried to prevent the progress of the rebels. Three of these blue helmets died last week in fighting with M23.
The Austral Africa Development Community (SADC, according to its acronym in English) also sent troops, most of them South African, who fight next to the Congolese army. Ten SADC soldiers have died in fighting in recent days.
