March 10, 2026: Last month, two mass graves were found containing the bodies of 172 of people the M23 rebels had killed. Last year the Congolese Army continued to confront M23 rebels in North Kivu province. The ceasefire negotiated in early 2023 with M23 broke down in late 2023. Fighting intensified in early 2024. By May 2024 fighting with M23 had displaced an estimated 1.7 million people. In June 2024 an M23 unit threatened to attack Goma. Most of the North Kivu combat between government forces and M23 occurs near or along the Congo-Rwanda border where Goma is on the border. Congo claims the Rwandan government backs M23 and has threatened to attack Rwanda, which denies the charge. In June 2024 UN observers estimated up to 3,000 Rwandan Army soldiers were deployed in North Kivu. Tribal loyalties play a major role in this conflict. Rwandan Tutsis dominate Rwanda’s government. M23 is dominated by ethnic Tutsis from eastern Congo. Congolese Tutsis are often referred to as Banyamulenge Tutsis. The term originally referred to ethnic Tutsis from a specific area in South Kivu province but has come to mean any ethnic Tutsis who live in Congo.

The war torn African nation of Congo recently suffered yet another disaster when Rwanda-based M23 rebels captured Goma, the provincial capital of North Kivu province. As of late 2025 M23 violated a peace treaty between Congo and Rwanda and renewed their offensive while continuing to hold Goma. M23 operations in the area led to over a million displaced civilians, causing a breakdown in medical care and government in general.

Félix Tshisekedi, the President since 2019, easily won the presidential and National Assembly elections at the end of 2023. Tshisekedi won because he had made considerable efforts to implement economic improvements that raised the standard of living for many Congolese. He was less successful in dealing with the growing threat from the M23 militia in eastern Congo, where the mining operations are.

Tshisekedi just defeating then-President Kabila in an election was a remarkable feat because the former president had enriched himself with corrupt dealings. The worst corruption was in eastern Congo including Ituri, North and South Kivu provinces and the southern Katanga province. These provinces are where foreign firms mine and export valuable minerals. The Congo government should have prospered from royalties earned from these foreign operations. Unfortunately, many of these foreigners, especially the Chinese, found it easier and cheaper to bribe key local officials and then do as they pleased. These corruption payments also enriched many Kabila allies in parliament. Once in office Tshisekedi took on Kabila and his powerful parliamentary coalition. Tshisekedi found allies in the UN and among donor countries and blocked Kabila’s efforts to hide his corrupt activities while president. By 2021 the mining contracts Kabila agreed to with China were being audited. The audits found evidence of extensive wrongdoing by Kabila and China, which lost those contracts. Kabila is very much on the defensive, as are his cronies in parliament and the courts.

In eastern Congo’s North Kivu province, thousands of people have been driven from their homes because of rebel and Islamic terrorist violence. Most of the violence has been caused by the Allied Democratic Forces/ADF rebels. This is a Ugandan organization with strong connections to Moslem tribes in northern Uganda. In fact, since 2014 it has been regarded as an Islamist group. Peacekeepers launched several operations in 2014 against ADF bases in Congo. The 2014 operations weakened the ADF but did not eliminate it. After the massive 2014 anti-ADF operation, the ADF was found to still have around 500 fighters in Congo. Its bases near the Ugandan border could have supported up to 2,000 fighters. Interrogators spoke with several captured ADF fighters who reported that the ADF had a very active recruitment network in east Africa. The ADF made money smuggling illegal timber in the form of logs. This is a major source of income because most of it was from rare and exotic trees. The ADF also enforced its own interpretation of Islamic or sharia law. ADF fighters enslave Congolese women and children who are not Moslem. If someone was caught trying to escape from an ADF camp, they faced death by beheading or crucifixion. Such practices were popular among Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant/ISIL groups in Syria, Iraq and Nigeria, but there is no evidence that ADF considers itself part of ISIL. ADF justifies its use of slavery and brutal forms of execution by claiming to be defending Islam from Christians. Over 90 percent of Congolese are Christian.