An estimated 250,000 Congolese have been made homeless since August 2008 because of the fighting - centred in North Kivu province, near the border with Rwanda and Uganda - between DRC defence forces (FARDC) and the militia known as the National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP), led by former general Laurent Nkunda.

DRC President Joseph Kabila named a new Government of “Combat and Reconstruction” in a bid to pacify the giant Central African country, shaken by an upsurge in rebel violence. Kabila dismissed his Defence and Interior Ministers in an apparent attempt to shake up the military’s response to the increasing threat posed by rebels in the eastern DRC, close to neighbouring Rwanda.

The International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) had come out to strongly condemn the deteriorating security situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo, terming it a major setback to the regional peace process.

War often leaves behind unresolved power struggles, particularly if a ceasefire was imposed on an unfinished civil war. The conflict in the DRC has served as a prime example of this phenomenon.

Seven months since the signing of the January 2008 peace agreement, horrendous violence continues to plague eastern Democratic Republic of Congo and provided ample signals to the international community of yet another catastrophe in the making.

United Nations officials reported at least 200 ceasefire violations in less than 180 days between January and July. Those newly displaced add to the 1 million people displaced from earlier waves of violence in North and South Kivu. At least one ceasefire violation, albeit difficult to monitor should have led to far greater efforts to prevent the outbreak of further violence, yet regrettably preventive diplomacy has failed…yet again.

The Goma agreement, signed by 22 armed groups and the Congolese government, followed a November 2007 agreement between the governments of Congo and Rwanda, known as the Nairobi Communiqué. This agreement sought to address the issue of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a Rwandan armed group based in eastern Congo. Under Article III of the Goma agreement (“Acte d’Engagement”), all the signatories committed to strictly respecting international humanitarian and human rights law, including ending all acts of violence and abuse against the civilian population. Regrettably this commitment was violated without second thought as to the devastating humanitarian consequences that are now plain to behold.

The top UN envoy to the Congo warned that renewed fighting in the east of the country has heightened ethnic tensions and could lead to the renewal of a wider conflict in central Africa and a return to full-scale civil war that could destroy the extremely fragile peace that now teeters on the brink.

The DRC remains a case study of the failure to effectively prevent conflict and if the phenomenon of “no war, no peace” is allowed to continue the continent should brace itself for the outbreak of ‘Africa’s Second World War’.

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