Security Negotiations Between the Congo and M23
Video Transcript:
Video Transcript:
Fighters from the Rwandan-backed militia M23 remain in control of the eastern Congolese city of Goma on Nov. 27. While negotiations between the group and the Congolese government have been proposed, neutralizing M23 will require a geopolitical compromise from the Congo, Rwanda, and to a lesser extent, Uganda.
M23 gained Goma, the capital city of the North Kivu province, the night of Nov. 20 less by direct conquest and rather by its abandonment by the Congolese army in the face of M23 threatening activity. M23, whose manpower was estimated at 4,000 prior to receiving upwards of a few thousand Congolese defections, has been operating with relative impunity in the mountainous jungle of North Kivu for several months. M23's predecessor, the National Congress for the Defense of the People, CNDP, had similarly fought from 2004 to 2009 as the superior armed group in North Kivu, consistently defeating numerically superior Congolese army efforts against it.
M23, and the National Congress for the Defense of the People before it, serves a Rwandan objective to secure a buffer zone in eastern Congo, to prevent a threat mobilizing against the government in Kigali. In a region with several militias and located 1,000 miles across thick rainforest from the capital, North Kivu is unable to be controlled effectively by Kinshasa. Factor in lucrative mining prospects to exploit directly and indirectly, Kigali has not budged from North Kivu nor is compelled to until a greater convention, like an international force choosing sides, beyond the M23-Congolese Armed Forces axis is brought to bear.
Ugandan efforts to mediate and generate a regional platform to meet Rwandan and Congolese interests led to Kampala hosting a summit of the region's heads of state Nov. 24-25. Uganda is not necessarily a neutral observer in the Congo, but it shares interests in common with both Congo and Rwanda.
Uganda, like Rwanda, is concerned with latent homegrown militias, the Lord’s Resistance Army and the Allied Democratic Front who have been driven to Congolese territory or beyond by offensive Ugandan security operations. Uganda equally holds economic interests in its border region with the Congo, notably drilling for crude oil in and around Lake Albert that forms much of the border between the two countries. Uganda asserts the right of self-defense in the Congo to maneuver against the militia, which has led to degree of stability required by international oil companies to invest and drill for oil. But ensuring the scale of stability sufficient to attract oil majors rather than mid-tier or even frontier operators will require the cooperation of the Congo government, whose side of Lake Albert has received minimal drilling attention relative to Uganda's. Uganda can clear out rebel militias from the frontier but cannot negotiate with global oil majors for drilling rights across Lake Albert. Rwanda, on the other hand, does not need to observe legal constraints like Uganda does because its proxies are involved in informal mining concessions requiring little more than pick axes, trucks, guns and pliant customs officers to mine and smuggle pockets of commodities to market.
The Ugandan summit unsurprisingly did not yield a tripartite accord, however. To Rwanda, Congo security guarantees are hollow and misdirected. To Congo, it cannot negotiate away its sovereignty in security or economic spheres. M23 itself may be reined in and pulled back from Goma should Rwanda desire to reduce its visibility, but a Congolese army offensive, as Congo threatens, will not yield a resolution to instability in eastern Congo. Conflict between Rwandan proxy forces and the Congo army will linger and remain indecisive until a political compromise is achieved between their political patrons.
