War / Africa
DRC-Rwanda Proxy War
M23 holds eastern Congo, every mediation track has collapsed, and Kinshasa is escalating legal pressure at the UN as the.
Pro-M23
Pro-DRC
No linked actors classified on this side yet.
War
The Eastern Congo War traces back to 1996, when Rwanda and Uganda invaded the Democratic Republic of Congo to hunt Hutu genocidaires who had fled across the border after Rwanda's 1994 genocide.
Two regional wars killed an estimated 5 million people by 2003. The fighting never ended. Today the Rwanda-backed M23 rebel movement controls Goma and large stretches of North Kivu, with Rwandan troops openly embedded in its ranks. Kinshasa fights back with Burundian soldiers, a Southern African regional force, and European mercenaries.
Beneath the war lies the world's richest deposits of cobalt, coltan, and tin, the metals that power every smartphone and electric vehicle on earth.
The Washington accord has reached only 35% implementation one year after signing, with M23 holding Goma, Uvira, and South Kivu and Rwanda showing no incentive to withdraw RDF forces or define FDLR neutralization while territorial and mineral control persists.
It matters because the war continues to tie down the main belligerents, pull in outside backers, and shape the security balance across Africa.
Weekly net escalation pressure, last 90 days
The Washington accord's 35% implementation rate after one year confirms structural failure: Rwanda retains full territorial and mineral leverage with no defined FDLR neutralization standard.
Kinshasa's shift to ICJ litigation and UN Security Council pressure signals it has abandoned confidence in the mediation track and is now pursuing coercive legal instruments.
The Bundibugyo Ebola outbreak is a direct conflict-generated cascade: militia control of Kivu blocks the 80% contact-tracing threshold, and the absence of a vaccine or approved treatment for this strain.
M23 functions as Rwanda's primary deniable armed lever in eastern DRC, with RDF troops embedded, supplying weapons.
FDLR serves as a cross-border Hutu genocidaire militia that Rwanda cites as a non-negotiable security precondition for any RDF withdrawal.
ADF operates as an ISIS-linked insurgent network sustaining a separate lethal violence track across North Kivu, Ituri, and Haut-Uele.
Africa Corps, Agemira RDC, and Congo Protection form Kinshasa's PMC combat network, providing deniable ground capacity alongside FARDC.
Burundi's military has deployed in support of FARDC, adding a state-level counterweight to Rwanda's proxy presence following M23's seizure of Uvira.
PRO-M23
PRO-DRC
War / Africa
M23 holds eastern Congo, every mediation track has collapsed, and Kinshasa is escalating legal pressure at the UN as the.
War / Africa
Pretoria is dead, Abiy holds a supermajority, and three simultaneous insurgencies now face an Eritrea-Egypt external axis.