As fierce violence with M23 rebels was ravaging in the east, the UN Security Council team arrived in the Democratic Republic of the Congo on Thursday for a three-day visit. Since resuming hostilities in late 2021, the Tutsi-led militia has taken control of large areas of land in the North Kivu province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Recent advances by M23 forces have also threatened to shut off all road connections to Goma, a metropolis of more than a million people on the border with Rwanda.
Before leaving on Saturday for Goma, the team is scheduled to meet with President Felix Tshisekedi.
The goal of the council’s visit, according to MONUSCO, the UN peacekeeping force in the DRC, was to evaluate the security and humanitarian conditions in North Kivu.
“We are here to support the action of MONUSCO, to remind that it is part of the solution to find peace,” said Gabon’s UN ambassador Michel Xavier Biang on his arrival in Kinshasa.
With more than 16,000 uniformed men, the peacekeeping force is one of the biggest and most expensive UN operations in the world.
The M23 rebels are among the hundreds of armed organizations that are active in the eastern DRC, and locals accuse it of neglecting to deal with them.
Numerous regional efforts to end the dispute have fallen short. A ceasefire broke down the same day it was supposed to go into effect thanks to mediation by Angola.
This weekend, French President Emmanuel Macron also warned to impose punishment on anybody responsible for breaking a truce. Rwanda is charged by the DRC government with supporting M23.
Although Kigali has denied it, UN experts, the US and several other western nations have also come to the conclusion that Rwanda supports the group.
800,000 people have been displaced as a result of fighting between the DRC army and M23.
