Uganda has reportedly dispatched another thousand soldiers into the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), joining a rapidly escalating battle in which a vicious Rwanda-supported insurgency called M23 has captured a regional capital and set its sights on the seat of government in Kinshasa.
Uganda already has about 3,000 soldiers in the chaotic eastern DRC, fighting in nominal support of President Felix Tshisekedi’s military against a host of armed rebel groups. M23 is the most infamous and dangerous of those groups, but Uganda is primarily concerned with another outfit called the Islamist Allied Defense Forces, also known as the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF).
The ADF is a terrorist gang linked to the Islamic State that wants to overthrow the governments of both the DRC and Uganda to create an Islamic “caliphate.”
Defeating the ADF is a mutual security concern of both the DRC and Uganda, but crimping their alliance is the inconvenient detail that Uganda allegedly supports M23.
The United Nations noted in July that Ugandan forces in the DRC have never lifted a finger to oppose M23 movement through territory under Ugandan control, and Ugandan military intelligence officers have been seen coordinating their activities with M23 leaders.
The head of the Ugandan military, Gen. Muhoozi Kainerugaba – who happens to the be the son of President Yoweri Museveni, now in power for almost four decades – has referred to M23 as “brothers of ours” and called on the DRC to stop fighting them.
“They are NOT terrorists! They are fighting for the rights of Tutsi in DRC,” he said, referring to the tribe from which most M23 members —and much of the Rwandan government — hail.
Uganda officially denies its support for M23, but other observers have noted that Ugandan forces seem much more interested in holding Congolese territory to defend Ugandan interests along the border than in helping the DRC control rebel groups. This includes Ugandan gold mines, not all of which are actually in Uganda.
Ugandan military spokesman Fleix Kulayigye on Tuesday said Ugandan forces in the eastern DRC have “changed their posture to offensive defense,” a puzzling formulation that might just indicate they are willing to help prevent M23 from pushing further south of Goma, the major city conquered by the insurgency last week.
“There’s still a lot of suspicion about Uganda, a lot of suspicion about what’s generally happening with the M23,” DRC Communications Minister Patrick Muyaya said when asked what the Ugandans might be up to.
M23 representatives, on the other hand, said they do not regard the Ugandans as an enemy force, and have no reason to expect hostilities.
As for the Rwandans, President Paul Kagame, who has also been in power for decades, bizarrely told CNN on Monday he had no idea whether or not Rwandan soldiers had crossed the border into the DRC.
“There are many things I don’t know. But if you want to ask me, is there a problem in Congo that concerns Rwanda? And that Rwanda would do anything to protect itself? I’d say 100 percent,” Kagame said.
Multiple international observers, including several U.N. agencies and the South African Development Community (SADC), have confirmed Rwandan soldiers entered the DRC city of Goma along with M23 fighters.
The threat in the Congo that Kagame would supposedly be protecting Rwanda from is the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), another of the more than 100 armed groups active in the eastern DRC. The FDLR is largely composed of Hutus – the tribe that slaughtered the Tutsis during the infamous Rwandan Genocide of 1994.
Kagame has accused the DRC government of supporting the FDLR, which is dedicated to overthrowing the Rwandan government – much as M23 is dedicated to overthrowing Tshisekedi and taking control of the DRC. Tshisekedi, in turn, accuses Kagame of using M23 as a “puppet” to overthrow his government, or at least seize control of valuable territory in the eastern Congo.
M23 declared a unilateral humanitarian ceasefire on Tuesday, purportedly to allow humanitarian aid and medical assistance to reach civilians in captive Goma. The Group of Seven (G7) nations demanded such a humanitarian corridor on Monday.
The rebels also reversed their previous boasts and said they do not plan to march on the national capital of Kinshasa, or even the nearby town of Bukavu.
“It must be made clear that we have no intention of capturing Bukavu or other areas. However, we reiterate our commitment to protecting and defending the civilian population and our positions,” an M23 spokesman said.
