KENYAN PEACEKEEPER KILLED. An EACRF senior official has confirmed that the mortar which killed a Kenyan peacekeeper was fired from the FARDC position, rejecting Kinshasa’s accusation that Rwanda planned the attack. This mirror propaganda campaign by Kinshasa hinders the regional peace process under the mediation of the EAC.
DISINFORMATION: A series of false flag attacks have been performed by the DRC government in North Kivu as part of a widespread mirror propaganda campaign with the aim to stage the “breaching of the ceasefire” by M23, accused by DRC government of being supported by Rwanda.
Along with FARDC spokesperson Guillaume Ndjike’s claims and with manipulated photos, the DRC Minister of communication Patrick Muyaya, has accused the Rwandan army of violating the DRC territory.
The East African Community and the UN peacekeeping mission MONUSCO, both currently present in the area, have not confirmed that these claims were true. The conspiracy campaign accuses Congolese Tutsi civilians of being supporters of M23, thus inciting hate violence against them, and it seeks to push for international intervention against M23 and Rwanda. One of the false flag attacks this week accuses M23 of having committed a massacre of “Hutu civilians”.
While these claims have not been verified or confirmed through any form of investigation, and due to the M23 reports of ethnic cleansing of the Congolese Tutsi in DRC by FARDC, Wazalendo, and the coalition of armed groups, the DRC government accuses “the Tutsi”, perceived as representative of M23 and the Rwandan government, of waging an ethnic war against “the Hutu”.
FRANCE 24 JUSTIN KABUMBA SPREADS DISINFORMATION. On October 23, quoting Jean-Pierre Bemba, DRC Vice Prime Minister, Justin Kabumba, correspondent of French newspapers France 24 and AP, was caught using a decade old photo to make it look like RDF is present on the DRC territory.
The image was taken by AFP in 2013 not in 2023.
HATE SPEECH, XENOPHOBIA, AND DRC PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS: DIDIER MUMENGI TO RUN DENIS MUKWEGE’S PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN. Former Minister of Information and the Press, under Laurent Désiré Kabila, Didier Mumengi, who was responsible for incitement to hate and persecution against the Tutsi in Kinshasa in 1998, now leads the presidential campaign of Nobel Peace Prize Winner Denis Mukwege. This places Denis Mukwege, notorious for his anti-Tutsi rhetoric, in the tradition of Congolese politicians who have been using Tutsiphobic populism to rally support for the 2023 presidential election.
J-L MELENCHON, WHOSE PARTY REFUSED TO DENOUNCE RECENT HAMAS TERRORIST ATTACK, VISITS DRC AFTER EXPLICIT ENDORSEMENT OF A GENOCIDE DENIAL THEORY. The Congolese member of French Parliament Carlos Martens Bilongo, who has called for sanctions against Rwanda in the French Parliament in July, has brought Melenchon to Kinshasa this week to meet with DRC president Felix Tshisekedi. Melenchon drew attention in the political debate last week following the Hamas attack and Israel’s violent retaliation by categorically refusing to use the term “terrorism”. Shortly afterwards, to qualify the support given to Israel by the President of the French Parliament, Yaël Braun-Pivet, he accused her of “camping out” in Tel Aviv to encourage the massacre in Gaza, provoking widespread commotion. The undisputed leader of the France Insoumise party travels to DRC escaping a major controversy, meeting Congolese officials whose double genocide negationnist beliefs he shares. Indeed, in 2021, on his Facebook page, he commented on the release of the Duclert Report commissioned by President Emmanuel Macron which has demonstrated France’s responsibility in the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda, that the Rwandan liberation army, which has stopped the genocide against the Tutsi in July 1994, has subsequently committed mass crimes in former Zaire. These false claims of double-genocide have been debunked numerous times by the UN.
ANTI-EAC PROPAGANDA IN DRC FOLLOWS ANTI-TUTSI RHETORIC. The growing hate speech campaign in DRC against EAC draws from the Hamitic theory and the “Hima-Tutsi Empire” conspiracy theory by state officials. On October 15, the member of DRC Parliament and former Prime Minister Justin Bitakwira, on the mainstream radio Top Congo stated “We have let ‘snakes’ enter our country from Rwanda… Kenya and Uganda”. He added that the presence of EAC equates to an “occupation of the Hima Empire”, and declares “I am not mentioning here Burundi who are Hutu.” A few months ago Bitakwira claimed that the presidents of Kenya and Uganda were Tutsi.
HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH IGNORES HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS IN DRC. HRW Activists Ida Sawyer, Thomas Fessy and Carine Kaneza Nantulya met on October 11 with DRC government’s spokesperson Patrick Muyaya to discuss “the general situation of human rights”, despite DRC having one of the worst human rights record in the world, including by the Congolese national army FARDC, and owing to the presence of over 260 armed groups committing atrocities against Congolese civilians. The deadliest armed groups operating freely in DRC, as reported by the UN and by HRW Thomas Fessy himself, including the genocidal force FDLR (which have committed the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda), have been integrated into the Congolese national army to fight against Congolese Tutsi civilians, a perceived “Rwandan threat”. This meeting took place a few days after HRW published a 150 pages report which continues to evidence their professional bias towards Rwanda. Meanwhile, Congolese state officials and members of the civil society, are actively spreading hate speech, inciting violence and war against Congolese Rwandophones, which HRW refuses to denounce.
THE IMPACT OF MILITIA PRESENCE AND VIOLENCE ON CROSS-BORDER SECURITY. Photos and videos of the genocidal force FLDR have been circulating on social media showing a threatening presence at Goma’s small barrier, at the border between DRC and Rwanda. Clashes between armed groups have claimed a civilian victim in Rubavu in Rwanda. The wounded victim is currently being treated. Rwanda’s Office of the Government’s Spokesperson announced that it will continue to protect its borders from incursions and will prevent the DRC conflict from spilling over into its territory.