Author: Wycliffe Nyamasege

Destexhe’s findings, which draw on firsthand testimonies, indicate that Tshisekedi’s administration has provided the FDLR with arms, equipment, and funding, contributing to its expansion.

According to the former lawmaker, while the FDLR operates highly organised autonomous units that are described as more disciplined than the FARDC, it is also fully integrated into the Congolese military’s chain of command.

Among the accounts shared with Destexhe was that of a young man, forcibly recruited by the FDLR at age 12, who served for six years. He disclosed that starting in 2022, he received a monthly salary of $120 through the FARDC, highlighting the extent of coordination between the two forces.

Similarly, an FARDC captain responsible for securing the Rubaya mine described seamless collaboration, with joint operations, helicopter resupply missions, and shared command structures involving the FDLR, the Wazalendo militia, and the FARDC.

Destexhe noted that, even more concerning, after 30 years of on-the-ground cooperation, many FDLR gunmen have been integrated into the FARDC, including in command positions, because they are often seen as “more capable officers.”

The former senator questioned the international community’s response, noting that despite the FDLR’s designation as a terrorist group, global actors have yet to fully address the consequences of its integration into the FARDC.

Destexhe warned that dismantling the FDLR is an immense challenge, especially since it sustains support networks in Europe through organisations that present themselves as human rights NGOs.

“Eradicating the FDLR’s influence would require a complete restructuring of the FARDC,” he said, calling the task “near impossible” without comprehensive reforms.

The FDLR has been accused of spreading genocidal ideology and targeting Kinyarwanda-speaking communities in eastern DRC, where hundreds of thousands have been displaced, with many seeking refuge in Rwanda.

The group has been collaborating with other militia groups and the Congolese forces to fight the M23 group, whose members have taken up arms to protest what they describe as poor governance, marginalisation, and decades of persecution.

Rwanda – RDC : Les FDLR sont complètement intégrés dans les FARDC – ENGLISH BELOW

Au cours de mon séjour au Kivu, j'ai recueilli plusieurs témoignages sur les FDLR. Selon mes sources, leur effectif aurait doublé depuis qu’ils sont armés, équipés et financés par Félix Tshisekedi,… pic.twitter.com/5ZeTwPbUGI

— Alain Destexhe (@Destexhe) June 9, 2025

The ceremony took place on Thursday, June 5, 2025.

During the ceremony, President N’Guesso welcomed the new envoy and spoke warmly of the strong bilateral relations and friendship shared between Rwanda and Congo.

He noted that the implementation of cooperation agreements between the two countries is progressing well and praised President Paul Kagame’s role in advancing collaboration and solidarity among African Union member states.

After delivering the message from President Kagame, Ambassador Busabizwa expressed his delight in representing Rwanda in the Congo and pledged to continue strengthening cooperation and cordial relations between the two nations.

Amb. Busabizwa previously served as the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Youth and has also served in various leadership positions, including as Vice Mayor of Kigali City in charge of Economic Affairs.

Speaking in an interview with the Rwanda Broadcasting Agency (RBA) on Sunday, June 8, Nduhungirehe described ECCAS as one of the least effective regional economic communities in the African Union, citing its dysfunctional leadership and failure to conduct audits of member states’ funds for a decade.

The minister’s remarks follow Rwanda’s abrupt exit from ECCAS on Saturday, during the 26th Ordinary Summit in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea.

Rwanda’s withdrawal was triggered by what it called a deliberate violation of its treaty-given right to assume the rotating chairmanship, a move orchestrated by the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and supported by certain ECCAS members.

During the Sunday night interview, Nduhungirehe elaborated on the deeper issues plaguing ECCAS, emphasising its governance and financial mismanagement.

“ECCAS has been a dysfunctional regional economic community, one of the least effective of all regional economic communities of the African Union,” he stated.

“We have issues of integration, of infrastructure, and of governance. We have a president of the commission who doesn’t act together with other commissioners. We have issues of audits since 2015 and 2020; we have never had any audit of the use of our money—the money of member states.”

The issues, combined with broader governance failures, such as the organisation’s inability to adhere to its own treaty and the exclusion of Rwanda from key discussions, fueled Kigali’s decision to leave the 11-member bloc, established in 1983 to promote economic integration in Central Africa.

Nduhungirehe also pointed to a pattern of marginalisation within ECCAS, citing a 2023 incident when the DRC, as chair, prevented Rwanda from speaking at the 22nd Summit in Kinshasa.

Rwanda’s formal protest to the African Union went unanswered, further highlighting ECCAS’s governance shortcomings.

“There has been a general issue of effectiveness and governance in ECCAS,” Nduhungirehe said, noting that the DRC’s recent move to block Rwanda’s chairmanship was “the straw that broke the camel’s back.”

The withdrawal marks a major shift in Central Africa’s diplomatic landscape, particularly amid ongoing tensions between Rwanda and the DRC over security issues in eastern Congo.

While Rwanda has exited ECCAS, Nduhungirehe emphasised that the country will continue to engage with other regional bodies, such as the East African Community (EAC) and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA).

He also reaffirmed Rwanda’s commitment to ongoing peace processes, including negotiations mediated by the AU and talks in Doha and Washington, despite what he described as the DRC’s unprincipled actions.

“It’s sad and unfortunate to see a community of 11 member states being manipulated by a single country,” Nduhungirehe said, lamenting ECCAS’s failure to uphold its founding principles of regional integration and cooperation.

He expressed hope that other member states, including Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and São Tomé and Príncipe, would recognise the organisation’s flawed trajectory.

In a human rights report released on May 30, the rebel group revealed that the militias’ tactics endangered civilians and violated international humanitarian law, a reality it says was completely omitted from Amnesty International’s recent report that accuses AFC/M23 of widespread human rights abuses.

The rebel alliance denounced Amnesty’s findings as politically motivated and misleading, arguing that they distort the realities on the ground and fuel misinformation about the group’s role in eastern DRC.

Amnesty International’s report alleges that M23 forces were responsible for killing, torturing, and forcibly disappearing detainees, as well as subjecting prisoners to inhumane conditions in detention sites. M23 rejected the allegations, stating that its own report is based on field investigations, eyewitness accounts, and verifiable documentation.

According to the group, its operations in Goma and Bukavu aimed to neutralise infiltrators while minimising disruption to civilians. The report claims that rebel-led efforts led to reduced violence, disarmament of hostile groups, and the establishment of humanitarian corridors—positive developments AFC/M23 says are routinely ignored by international watchdogs.

The group also addressed claims surrounding the January 27 tragedy at Munzenze Prison, where 165 women reportedly died after a fire and mass escape. AFC/M23 maintains that it had not yet entered Goma at the time and accused Amnesty International of failing to verify the sequence of events before assigning blame.

“These incidents at Munzenze Prison happened before AFC/M23 got there,” Delion Kimbulungu, the Secretary of AFC/M23 clarified.

Furthermore, the rebels challenged widely circulated figures that 3,000 people died during the seizure of Goma. The rebel group said 874 bodies were found between February 2 and 13, and attributed the deaths to crossfire in combat zones, not systematic executions.

“These numbers were fabricated for political purposes,” Kimbulungu said.

AFC/M23 also criticised Nobel Peace Prize laureate Dr. Denis Mukwege for his comments on France24, accusing the group of mass atrocities. The rebel alliance described his remarks as biased and aligned with the Kinshasa government’s narrative.

Some regional security analysts have continued to echo concerns about the imbalance in international reporting, accusing groups such as Amnesty International of a clear failure to investigate all parties equally.

In a post shared on X, Nduhungirehe described as “unbelievable and unacceptable” the DRC’s ongoing efforts to rally accusations and sanctions against Rwanda in various regional and international fora, even as both countries are engaged in US-facilitated peace negotiations.

“It’s unbelievable and unacceptable to note that… Rwanda and DRC are actively engaged, over the past month, into promising US-facilitated negotiations for a historic peace agreement, [yet] the DRC, nonetheless, is still whining around in all regional and international organisations accusing Rwanda for its own turpitudes,” he wrote.

The minister’s remarks came moments after Rwanda announced its exit from ECCAS, citing a pattern of exclusion and deliberate obstruction led by the DRC, particularly during the 26th Ordinary Summit held on June 7 in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea.

According to Nduhungirehe, despite recent progress in diplomatic engagement—including a March 18 meeting between Presidents Paul Kagame and Félix Tshisekedi in Doha, and the signing of a Declaration of Principles between both countries in Washington on April 25—the DRC continues to undermine trust-building efforts by pursuing parallel campaigns against Rwanda.

“Rwanda is engaged in all current peace processes (AU/EAC-SADC, Washington and Doha) in good faith and with a sense of responsibility,” he stated, but warned that Kigali “will never accept the manipulation, by a reckless and hopeless DRC, of regional economic communities such as ECCAS.”

He further argued that ECCAS has no legitimate mandate to mediate the crisis in eastern DRC, a role already entrusted to the East African Community (EAC) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC), under the African Union’s designated mediator, President Faure Gnassingbé of Togo.

The ECCAS dispute centres on what Rwanda has described as a violation of its rights under the organisation’s founding treaty.

In a statement issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Kigali denounced the bloc’s failure to grant it the rotating chairmanship from Equatorial Guinea, as provided for under Article 6 of the ECCAS Treaty.

Instead, DRC opposed this, an act Rwanda views as a politically motivated breach of protocol.

This latest fallout adds to already strained ties between Rwanda and the DRC, whose relationship has been marred by mistrust. While Kinshasa accuses Kigali of supporting the M23 rebel movement operating in eastern Congo, Rwanda has repeatedly rejected the claims and has instead called out the DRC for its continued collaboration with the FDLR, a militia group linked to the perpetrators of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.

With Rwanda now formally out of ECCAS, attention shifts back to ongoing diplomatic efforts in Washington, Doha, and under AU-mandated mediation. However, Minister Nduhungirehe’s remarks suggest that Kigali is growing increasingly impatient with what it sees as duplicity from its counterpart in Kinshasa.

The Special Investigations Unit (SIU) concluded there were “no reasonable grounds” to lay charges in the November 2024 shooting, which drew outrage from the Rwandan-Canadian community and sparked months of calls for accountability.

Kabera was shot multiple times on November 9, 2024, in the hallway of his Main Street West apartment building after police responded to reports of a man appearing to carry a handgun and behaving erratically.

According to the SIU report, Kabera was holding a replica firearm and advanced toward the officers before being shot. He was hit by eight bullets and died in hospital hours later.

“The object in the complainant’s possession was not an actual firearm, although it did give the appearance of being a genuine semi-automatic pistol,” said SIU Director Joseph Martino.

“The officers reasonably believed their lives, and those of nearby residents, were in danger,” he added.

The decision to clear the officers has left Kabera’s grieving family and members of the Rwandan diaspora dismayed.

In a statement released through their legal counsel, Falconers LLP, the family expressed their disappointment: “Erixon was loved by many and is deeply missed by his family, friends, and his community both in Canada and in Rwanda. We are disappointed with the findings of the investigation and are considering our legal options.”

Kabera, who worked as a Resource Officer with the Canada Revenue Agency and held leadership roles within the Rwandan community, including serving as Vice President of the Rwandan Community Abroad in Toronto, was remembered as a gentle and dedicated man who championed youth empowerment and cultural healing.

His brother, Parfait Karekezi, described him as a confidant, mentor, and friend. “Erixon was everything to me,” he said in an earlier interview. “I don’t even know how I’m going to live with this.”

The SIU report said police fired as many as 24 rounds after Kabera exited his apartment holding the replica gun at waist level. One officer also deployed a Taser. During the altercation, one officer was wounded in the head by a bullet fired mistakenly by the other officer.

While the SIU acknowledged the officers’ mistaken belief that they were under fire, the family has long questioned whether the police response was proportional and why alternative de-escalation measures weren’t used.

“The initial narrative presented to the public was both misleading and damaging,” the family stated in November, referring to a police update that initially suggested an exchange of gunfire. The SIU later corrected that, confirming only police discharged weapons.

In the over 200 days it took to complete the investigation, community leaders, including Alain Patrick Ndengera, Chairperson of the Rwandan Community in Canada, called for transparency and independent oversight.

“If any police officers are found to have acted wrongly, they should face the courts,” Ndengera said.

The Hamilton Police Service acknowledged the “profound impact” the shooting has had and offered to meet with Kabera’s family and Rwandan community leaders “when the community is ready.”

But for many, the conclusion of the investigation offers little closure.

“They killed him like a dog,” Kabera’s brother Yves Ikobe said in a past interview, recounting bullet holes left in the apartment wall and the trauma his family has endured.