Rwandan President Kagame Says Violence In Eastern DRC Not Rwanda’s Problem

Rwandan President Paul Kagame on Wednesday said the soaring death toll in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) east was not his government’s problem, reported The TRT World.

“The problem was not created by Rwanda, and it is not Rwanda’s problem,” Kagame told an audience off-site from the US-Africa Summit in Washington. “It is Congo’s problem.”

In a preliminary investigation, the United Nations (UN) mission in DR Congo found that at least 131 people lost their lives in attacks by the M23 rebels last month. As per the investigation, the victims were shot or stabbed to death in Kishishe and Bambo villages in eastern DRC.

As per data collected by the UN, over 200,000 people wtheir homes due to the fighting between the army and the M23 rebels.

DRC continue to accuse the Rwandan government of backing the March 23 Movement (M23) rebels who have occupied large areas in north-eastern part of the country.

Kagame has rejected all the allegations and instead accuses Kinshasa of collusion with the FDLR, a Hutu movement formed by some of the perpetrators of the 1994 Tutsi genocide in Rwanda.

“I cannot be responsible for… Congolese of Rwandan descent in Congo who are being denied their rights as citizens,” Mr. Kagame said.

Fighting in the eastern North Kivu region has fuelled the already tense relations between DR Congo and Rwanda. The DR Congo government expelled the Rwandan ambassador on October 29.

On Tuesday during a meeting with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, DR Congo President Felix Tshisekedi said that his country was victim of an aggression which is hidden, but it’s from Rwanda, and this has been destabilising.

When asked if Kagame will meet the US President, the Rwandan president said he did not yet know whether he would meet with President Biden during the US-Africa Summit in Washington.