The Democratic Republic of the Congo said on Friday it has filed a case against Rwanda at the International Court of Justice, accusing its neighbour of bearing legal responsibility for more than three decades of violence that has devastated the country’s eastern region.
DRC accused Rwanda of breaching international conventions on genocide, racial discrimination, discrimination against women and torture.
It said civilians in the east have suffered massacres, extrajudicial killings, torture, sexual violence, forced displacement and ethnic and gender-based discrimination since the 1990s.
Mineral-rich eastern DRC has been battered by decades of conflict as government forces and allied militias fight more than 100 armed groups, the most potent of them the Rwandan-backed M23 rebels.
Its fighters made major advances early last year, seizing Goma and other key cities as they quickly expanded their presence.
Responsible for the conflict
The UN has called the conflict in eastern DRC “one of the most protracted, complex, serious humanitarian crises on Earth.”
The violence goes back to the 1994 Rwandan genocide, when Hutu fighters responsible for the killings fled across the border into eastern DRC.
Rwanda has repeatedly sent troops or backed armed groups there in the years since, saying it was acting to neutralise Hutu fighters and protect its security.
DRC and the US government have accused Rwanda of using the rebels as a pretext to gain access to the region’s mineral wealth.
DRC named a string of Rwandan-backed rebel groups it blames for the violence over the years, including M23.
It asked the ICJ to declare Rwanda internationally responsible for the conflict, order it to halt its activities in DRC, demand guarantees they won’t be repeated, and award reparations to DRC and civilian victims.
The court said in a statement that DRC had filed an application instituting proceedings. It did not say whether it had determined whether it had jurisdiction to hear the case.
Third time taking Rwanda to the ICJ
Rwanda’s government did not immediately respond publicly to the filing of the case.
It has consistently denied backing armed groups in DRC, though UN experts have said they found evidence that Rwandan troops have fought alongside and directed M23.
This is DRC’s third attempt to bring Rwanda before the ICJ, the United Nations’ highest court for disputes between states.
Congolese authorities withdrew an earlier case in 2001, and the court dismissed a second in 2006 for lack of jurisdiction, finding Rwanda had not signed or had entered reservations to some of the treaties DRC cited, or that other conditions for a case weren’t met.
The new filing comes as separate, US- and Qatar-mediated peace talks between DRC and Rwanda have struggled to produce a lasting deal.
On Thursday, the US imposed sanctions on a Rwanda — based gold refinery, describing it as being part of “a network working in coordination” with M23 in eastern DRC.
It said the sanctions against Gasabo Gold Refinery were in support of the US and Qatari peace efforts.
