Rwanda’s M23 denials, blatant lies and utter shamelessness 

The conflict in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has dominated the headlines for much of February. Fighting between Congolese troops ― known by their French acronym FARDC ― and M23 rebels has displaced at least one million people. 

The UN refugee agency, or UNHCR, estimates that since clashes between rebel armies in the DRC started more than 20 years ago, they have displaced at least six million people. Another six million have been killed since 1996, according to the website World Without Genocide. 

One country in the Great Lakes region at the heart of the DRC conflict is Rwanda. Rwanda is accused by the DRC of supporting the M23 rebels, who derive their name from a peace agreement they signed on March 23, 2009. Burundi also accuses Rwanda of backing rebels bent on destabilising it. 

There is irrefutable evidence ― all coming from credible sources ― suggesting that Rwanda backs M23. And that evidence has been around for more than a decade. 

For example, in 2012, the UN Security Council’s Group of Experts said in a confidential report that Rwanda and Uganda were supporting M23 rebels in their offensive against Congolese government troops in North Kivu province. 

The 44-page report said Rwandan officials “exercised overall command and strategic planning for M23”. The experts released another 131-page report in August 2022, accusing Rwanda of backing M23. 

All countries criticising or urging Rwanda to stop backing the M23 rebels are basing their statements not on hearsay but on incontrovertible evidence that it is involved in the DRC conflict. 

The US State Department said recently “the worsening violence is caused by the actions of the Rwanda-backed, US- and UN-sanctioned M23 armed group”. It called on Rwanda “to immediately withdraw all Rwanda Defence Force personnel from the [Congo] and remove its surface-to-air missile systems.” 

Belgium has called on Rwanda to cease all assistance to the M23 rebels, and Human Rights Watch says its own investigation and that of the UN “provide significant photographic and other evidence that Rwanda is not only giving logistical support to the M23, but that Rwandan troops are reinforcing or fighting alongside the armed group inside Congo.” 

In the second week of February, police in the DRC’s capital, Kinshasa, battled protesters who were accusing Western governments of failing to use their influence over Rwanda to curb the violence in the east. The protesters did not name Kenya or Somalia or Uganda. 

It is hard to think of more direct evidence ― because it is all as clear as the mountain gorillas in the Virunga Massif. 

And how does Rwanda react when evidence of its military support for the M23 rebels is made public? It shamelessly issues risible denials, which are in effect blatant lies because they contain some statements that the issuers and the general public know are not true.

When you reflect on this deeply, you begin to realise why even some things Rwanda says it has accomplished are sometimes thought to be fabrications. 

In 2017, Bert Ingelaere, a lecturer at the University of Antwerp, wrote that the Rwandan government’s record is shakier than it looks, including on some of the major achievements it is credited with. 

Mr Ingelaere cited a large-scale study of poverty in Rwanda that he was working on with a World Bank team but was abandoned after “Rwandan security forces seized half of our files on the pretext that our research’s design was tainted by ‘genocide ideology’.” 

If a government can lie while denying that it supports rebels fighting a foreign government, what will stop it from lying about its poverty levels?

Mr Musaazi Namiti is a journalist and former
Al Jazeera digital editor in charge of the Africa desk
[email protected]  @kazbuk