Rwanda-Backed Rebels Capture Goma

By Nosmot Gbadamosi

Welcome to Foreign Policy’s Africa Brief.

The highlights this week: A deadly drone strike hits a hospital in Sudan, a Sahel alliance deploys counterterrorism troops, and China acquires a crypto mining hub in Ethiopia.

If you would like to receive Africa Brief in your inbox every Wednesday, please sign up here.

An alliance that includes the March 23 Movement (M23) rebel group had taken control of the city of Goma in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo as of late Sunday. Lawrence Kanyuka, a spokesperson for the M23 militia—which U.N. experts say is funded and armed by Rwanda—called for calm in a post on X on Monday, stating that “the liberation” of Goma “had been completed.”

Tens of thousands of people are now fleeing the densely populated city of about 1.5 million. Earlier this month, about 400,000 people had already fled fighting elsewhere in the region and headed toward Goma, according to the United Nations, joining about 6 million people across the nation who are already displaced by conflict. Hospitals are overwhelmed by hundreds of casualties, and bodies lay on the streets, the U.N. and other aid agencies told a news briefing Tuesday.

“Roads are blocked, and the airport can no longer be used for evacuation or humanitarian efforts. M23 has declared the airspace over Goma closed,” the U.N. special representative for Congo, Bintou Keita, told an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council on Sunday.

During the U.N. meeting, Congolese Foreign Minister Thérèse Kayikwamba Wagner accused Rwanda of sending its troops over the border to help the rebels in “a declaration of war that no longer hides itself behind diplomatic manoeuvres.” She added that “Rwanda is preparing to orchestrate a carnage in broad daylight.” Rwanda’s representative did not deny the claim, although the country has denied backing M23 in the past.

Goma is the provincial capital of the Congolese state of North Kivu, whose governor—Maj. Gen. Peter Cirimwami—was shot dead by M23 fighters as they advanced, capturing the nearby towns of Saké and Minova. Goma is close to the Rwandan border and acts as a vital transport hub within a key mining region, making it a significant territorial gain.

While the rebels once briefly held Goma in 2012, the group has never held as much territory as they do now. Since 2021, the rebels have seized control of the regions surrounding lucrative mines, including Rubaya—one of the world’s largest sources of coltan, a mineral used to power laptops and smartphones.

A U.N. report published in December accused M23 of shipping the mineral to Rwanda and obscuring the shipments as Rwandan production—an operation that has resulted in “the largest contamination of mineral supply chains in the Great Lakes region recorded to date.” The report also suggested that Congolese gold was being illegally siphoned off through Rwanda.

The United States and U.N. experts have accused Rwanda of backing M23. There are about 4,000 Rwandan troops fighting alongside the militia, according to a U.N. report circulated in July 2024.

“There’s no question that there are Rwandan troops in Goma supporting the M23,” U.N. peacekeeping forces’ chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix told reporters on Tuesday. Local accounts suggest that atrocities are being committed, including allegations of rape being used as a weapon of war as well as the beheading of civilians.

A coalition formed of soldiers from the Southern African Development Community, U.N. troops, and Congo’s army have been trying to push back the rebels but at least 17 peacekeepers have been killed in recent weeks. More than 21 million people across Congo need aid, “one of the highest numbers worldwide,” the U.N. warned, and the situation is rapidly deteriorating.

Rwandan President Paul Kagame claims that the DRC is supporting Hutu extremists belonging to the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, which opposes Kagame’s Tutsi-dominated government. The M23 militia is largely made up of ethnic Tutsis who broke away from the Congolese army more than a decade ago. Congo ended diplomatic ties with Rwanda late on Saturday.

The Biden administration had suggested expanding its signature Lobito Corridor project deeper into eastern Congo to generate peace—but Rwanda reportedly walked away from talks, according to Molly Phee, the former U.S. assistant secretary of state for African affairs. It’s no surprise, since the proposal offered no incentives to Rwanda and would impact its unofficial trading of Congolese minerals.

More than 40 percent of Rwanda’s state budget currently comes from foreign aid, and at least some of that is allegedly being used to finance M23. Temporarily removing at least some of Rwanda’s aid could bring it back to the negotiating table—as it did more than a decade ago—and possibly force M23 to withdraw from Goma.

In July 2012, then-U.S. President Barack Obama withheld a tiny sum of $200,000 in aid to Rwanda, and M23 attacks stopped soon after.

“Action would be easy because the main instigator of the M23 conflict has been the government of Rwanda, a country dependent on foreign aid,” wrote Jason Stearns in the Financial Times. What happens in Congo will depend on the threat of sanctions to Rwanda.

Wednesday, Jan. 29: Congolese President Félix Tshisekedi and his Rwandan counterpart, Paul Kagame, are scheduled to attend an emergency summit of the East African Community called by Kenyan President William Ruto.

Friday, Jan. 31: Kenya and Uganda release inflation data for January.

British Foreign Secretary David Lammy visits Tunisia.

U.N. Security Council discusses the situation in Sudan.

Deadly Sudanese airstrikes. At least 70 people have been killed in a drone strike on the last remaining functional hospital in the besieged city of El Fasher, the capital of the state of North Darfur.

“The appalling attack on Saudi Hospital in El Fasher … led to 19 injuries and 70 deaths among patients and companions,” the World Health Organization’s director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, wrote on X on Sunday. “At the time of the attack, the hospital was packed with patients receiving care.”

The attack on the Saudi Teaching Maternal Hospital was blamed by Sudan’s military government on the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). El Fasher is strategically important as one of the last areas in Darfur still under the control of Sudan’s army. U.S. sanctions targeting the warring generals driving the conflict—army chief Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and RSF leader Mohamed Hamdan “Hemeti” Dagalo—have not stopped the fighting due to both sides receiving support from Persian Gulf nations.

Meanwhile, a BBC report published last week said that scores of Sudanese women and girls fleeing civil war have been sexually abused in Libya. Women who spoke to the BBC alleged beatings and gang rapes by human traffickers and Libyan security forces. Some of those who found domestic work were also raped by their employers. More than 200,000 people have entered Libya since the war began in April 2023, according to the UNHCR.

Sahel Alliance deploys troops. The military juntas in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger have formed a 5,000-strong joint force to combat cross-border insurgencies by jihadi groups, according to Niger’s defense chief, Salifou Mody.

“The unified AES force is nearly ready, numbering 5,000 personnel,” Mody said on state television, referring to the three nations’ cooperation pact, known as the Alliance of Sahel States (AES in French). The three countries exited the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) on Jan. 29, but they were given a six-month grace period by the regional bloc, during which they can reconsider their decision to leave. The nations started issuing their own joint passports this week to replace the ECOWAS passport.

Will OPEC raise output? U.S. President Donald Trump has pressured OPEC members to increase oil production, arguing that tumbling oil prices would end Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “Right now, the price is high enough that that war will continue. You gotta bring down the oil price and end the war,” he said, speaking via video link at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Thursday.

The OPEC+ group of producers, which includes Russia, said that it already had a plan to raise output starting in April. But OPEC members such as Nigeria want output to be raised faster, having improved on security and infrastructure issues that previously left it struggling to reach its allocated quota.

Output in Nigeria rose from 1.1 million barrels a day in June 2023 to 1.48 million barrels a day last month—close to its OPEC ceiling of 1.5 million. Yet Nigeria also has to balance its goal, since it is heavily dependent on oil revenue and would struggle at oil prices of less than $80 a barrel. Angola quit OPEC last January because it wanted to produce more oil than its quota limit in order to grow the country’s economy.

Gabon prepares for election. Gabon said it would hold presidential elections on Apr. 12, paving a path towards reestablishing an ostensibly civilian government after an August 2023 military coup toppled the Bongo dynasty’s decadeslong rule. Coup leader Brice Oligui Nguema is expected to run in the ballot and win.

Chinese firm’s Ethiopian cryptocurrency hub. BIT Mining, a Chinese bitcoin mining company, has expanded into Ethiopia by acquiring a 51-megawatt mining facility for $14 million. The company also operates mining centers in the United States as well as China and Hong Kong. Ethiopia has become a hub for Chinese cryptocurrency miners due to low electricity costs. According to the Reporter, Ethiopia’s electricity prices are 70 percent cheaper than they are at Bit Mining’s facility in Ohio because much of the African facility’s power is generated from its controversial mega-dam on the Nile River.

Burkina Faso launches electric cars. Burkinabè car manufacturer Itaoua unveiled the country’s first locally made electric car last Thursday as part of a government policy aimed at making the country self-sufficient. In recent months, military leader Ibrahim Traoré had directed all civil servants to shift to electric vehicles—which will be shipped from China. However, the lack of infrastructure for charging points may be an obstacle to Traoré’s green vision. Less than 20 percent of the country’s population had access to electricity in 2022, according to the most recent World Bank data.

• Mexico Responds to Trump’s First Moves by Catherine Osborn
• Greenland’s Door Is Open for Trump by Paul Hockenos
• How Denmark Can Hit Back Against Trump on Greenland by Elisabeth Braw

South Africa shelves Russian refinery project. A deal between South Africa’s state-owned oil company and widely sanctioned Russian bank Gazprombank has been terminated, reports Susan Comrie in AmaBhungane. Gazprombank offered just $60 million of the $200 million that it had pledged toward the project to restart a gas refinery. It also argued for full ownership.

Ghana’s abandoned biracial children. Ghana has a well-known legacy of children fathered by Chinese migrants brought up by their Ghanaian mothers without financial support. In investigative platform the Fourth Estate, Seraphina Quaicoe interviews biracial children living in the city of Wassa Akropong, often called “China Town” in Ghana. “This is not merely a story about illegal mining or environmental destruction. It’s about children constructing identities in the shadows of economic transactions and women rebuilding their lives with scarce resources,” Quaicoe writes.

A vision for LGBTQ love in Nigeria. In Open Country Mag, Orji Victor Ebubechukwu reviews the Nigerian documentary This Is Love about LGBTQ+ couples who married in a country where the law forbids it. The documentary was awarded the best LGBT feature at the Bahia Independent Cinema Festival in Brazil. “I wanted a story that the average LGBTQ+ person in Nigeria could relate to … and potentially cause the average Nigerian to reflect on their bias,” said director Victor Ugoo, adding, “Nobody deserves to be that security-conscious while trying to get laid or find love.”