The cost of Congo’s instability to Uganda

The M23 rebels continue to seize large swathes of territory across the North Kivu theatre, eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), after a renewed phase of fighting reawakened the spectre of a regional war. 

Viewed as Africa’s sick man, the current cycle of violence in the DRC is a confluence of the lasting vestiges of colonialism—the role of brigand militias across the local and transboundary landscape; mercenary cut-throats seeking a slice of the vast mineral wealth and an unmoored United Nations Stabilisation Mission in the DRC (MONUSCO).