Kinshasa, Jan 17 (IANS) About 237,000 people have been displaced since the beginning of 2025 in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), one of the world’s largest hosts of people uprooted within their own borders, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said on Friday.
Escalating clashes between armed groups and the DRC army in North and South Kivu provinces, already home to 4.6 million internally displaced people, are intensifying one of the world’s most alarming yet under-reported humanitarian crises, UNHCR spokesperson Eujin Byun said at a press briefing.
From January 1 to 6, intense fighting in the Masisi and Lubero territories of North Kivu Province forced about 150,000 individuals to flee their homes, while 84,000 people have been displaced in South Kivu’s Fizi territory, the UN agency said, noting that civilians in both regions are enduring indiscriminate bombings.
On Wednesday, during a cabinet meeting chaired by President Felix Tshisekedi, the DRC government announced that the military had recovered several strategic localities in the eastern part of the country previously occupied by the March 23 Movement rebellion.
“The DRC Armed Forces remain determined on all front lines to restore security, recover lost areas, and restore the territorial integrity of the DRC,” government spokesman Patrick Muyaya said late Wednesday, Xinhua news agency reported.
Last month, a peace summit to address conflicts in the DRC was called off at the last minute due to a tough negotiation standoff.
Angolan President Joao Lourenco was set to host DRC President Felix Tshisekedi and Rwandan President Paul Kagame, in a bid to ease tensions gripping the eastern DRC by securing an agreement supposed to be signed by the three heads of state.
The summit was planned as part of the “Luanda Process,” a peace initiative launched in 2022 and endorsed by the African Union, to accelerate regional stabilization.
The eastern DRC continues to face instability due to the M23 rebel group, which has been advancing and seizing large areas of territory. The DRC government accuses neighboring Rwanda of providing military support to the M23, an allegation Kigali denies.
While denying ties to the M23, Rwanda has accused the DRC military of collaborating with the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, a Rwandan rebel group whose members are blamed for the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda.
–IANS
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