DRC takes Rwanda to ICJ over alleged abuses in eastern Congo

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is taking Rwanda to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for its role in three decades of alleged “abuses” in the country’s east.

The Congolese government filed the application with the ICJ – the United Nations’s principal court for disputes between states – on Friday, accusing Kigali of bearing direct responsibility for years of massacres, displacement and atrocities in eastern DRC, which borders Rwanda.

The dispute concerns “abuses attributable to Rwanda over a period extending from 1996 to the present day”, the ICJ said in a statement, confirming ⁠it had received DRC’s application to start a case.

The Congolese application stated that the abuses “have primarily targeted Hutus present on Zairian, and subsequently Congolese, territory following the genocide against the Tutsi in 1994” in Rwanda.

However, the filing added that other Congolese ethnic groups, including the Nyindu, Bembe, Lega, Nande, Hunde and Bashi, have also been targeted.

“The civilian populations of eastern DRC have been victims of massacres, extrajudicial executions, acts of torture, sexual violence, forced displacement, and discrimination,” the Congolese government said in its statement, describing suffering of “exceptional magnitude”.

The filing alleges that Rwandan armed forces, alongside proxy groups including the M23/AFC alliance, and Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire (AFDL), have conducted unlawful military operations across eastern DRC since the 1994 Rwandan genocide. These operations have targeted refugee camps, villages, and urban centres, continuing through the First and Second Congo Wars and into the present day, it added.

M23, the most prominent of the named groups, captured the strategic Congolese cities of Goma and Bukavu in early 2025, displacing hundreds of thousands and reversing decades of fragile peace building.

The conflict has exposed the failure of recent diplomatic efforts, including a US-brokered peace deal signed in June 2025 and a subsequent Qatari-mediated ceasefire declaration, both of which have failed to halt the violence.

Rwanda has consistently denied backing M23, instead justifying its military presence in eastern DRC as self-defence against the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a Hutu militia formed from remnants of the forces that perpetrated the 1994 genocide. Kigali accuses Kinshasa of harbouring the group, a claim DRC rejects.

United Nations experts and Western governments have largely accepted DRC’s position on Kigali’s role in the east, finding substantial evidence of Rwandan support for M23.

DRC is asking the ICJ to order Rwanda to cease all alleged “violations” and award full reparations to both the state and its victims.

There was no immediate response from Kigali, which has consistently denied backing any armed groups operating in DRC.

This is the third time DRC has sought ICJ action against Rwanda. A previous attempt in 2006 was dismissed after the court found it lacked jurisdiction.