DR Congo strips ex-President Kabila of immunity
The Senate in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has voted overwhelmingly in favour of lifting the immunity of ex-President Joseph Kabila.
In a secret ballot on Thursday night, the parliament voted by 88 votes to five to make Kabila liable for prosecution. The former head of state has been accused of treason for alleged links to the M23 armed group, which has taken control of swaths of territory in eastern DRC with the backing of Rwanda.
Authorities said earlier this month that Kinshasa had amassed clear evidence implicating him in 'treason, war crimes, crimes against humanity and participation in an insurrectionary movement'.
Kabila, who denies any ties to the rebel group, stepped down after almost 20 years in power in 2018, yielding to protests. However, he enjoyed immunity from prosecution thanks to an honorific title as senator for life.
Earlier this month, the attorney general of the Congolese army demanded that honour be lifted.
'The Senate authorises the prosecution and lifting of Joseph Kabila's immunity,' Senate speaker Jean-Michel Sama Lukonde said after the vote.
Kabila has not commented on his immunity being lifted.
Last year he denied allegations from his successor President Felix Tshisekedi that he was supporting the rebels and 'preparing an insurrection' in eastern DRC.
Tshisekedi has in the meantime suspended Kabila's People's Party for Reconstruction and Democracy (PPRD) and security forces have raided several of the former leader's properties.
PPRD Deputy Secretary-General Ferdinand Kambere told the AFP news agency that Kabila's prosecution is pure 'theatre' to distract the Congolese people from debates on the conflict and corruption in the country.
The former president has been outside the Central African country since late 2023, mostly in South Africa.
However, he has threatened to return to help the country resolve the continuing fighting in eastern areas, as well as making increasingly vocal criticism of Tshisekedi.
A return to the country by Kabila could complicate the bid to end the rebellion. Reports in April that he was in the east have not been confirmed.
Despite DRC's army and M23 agreeing to work towards a truce earlier this month, fighting continues in the eastern province of South Kivu.
The long-running tensions in eastern DRC flared into conflict in January when M23 captured the city of Goma, followed by the seizure of Bukavu in February.
The group is seeking control of the vast mineral wealth in the eastern areas and has ambitions to take power in Kinshasa.
Amid the ongoing fighting, the army and armed groups announced peace talks in the Qatari capital, Doha, in early May.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Al Jazeera
10 hours ago
- Al Jazeera
Interpol red notice issued for Ghana's former finance minister
Ghana's former finance minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, has been placed on Interpol's red notice list after allegedly using public office for personal gain. Ofori-Atta, whose location remains unclear as he reportedly seeks medical treatment, is being investigated over a string of high-profile contracts relating to petroleum revenues, electricity supply and ambulance procurement. He is also under investigation over a controversial national cathedral project that swallowed tens of millions of dollars in public money yet remains little more than a hole in the ground. The red notice – a request to police worldwide to detain a suspect pending extradition – was issued four days after Ghana's Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) re-declared the 65-year-old a wanted person after he failed to appear for a scheduled interrogation. The OSP insists Ofori-Atta must appear in person, rejecting requests from his legal team for a virtual session on medical grounds. The prosecutor's notice, published by the state-run Ghana News Agency on Monday, stated a number of possible locations, including the United States, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Guyana, Hong Kong and the Cayman Islands. 'We will not countenance this conduct, not in this case,' Special Prosecutor Kissi Agyebeng told local media on Monday. Frank Davies, a member of Ofori-Atta's legal team, was cited by the news agency AFP as saying medical records had been submitted 'in good faith', but that 'the office has chosen to ignore them'. 'The special prosecutor is not being sensitive to the issues at hand, especially knowing that Mr Ofori-Atta is unwell and receiving treatment,' said Davies on Friday. The new administration of President John Mahama has been on the heels of former government appointees to account for their tenure in office. The attorney general is currently building 33 cases of corruption and related offences against former government appointees. Ofori-Atta served as former President Nana Akufo-Addo's finance minister for seven years.
Al Jazeera
3 days ago
- Al Jazeera
More than four million people have fled Sudan amid war, UN says
More than four million people have fled Sudan since the start of its civil war in 2023, officials with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) say. 'Now in its third year, the four million people is a devastating milestone in what is the world's most damaging displacement crisis at the moment,' agency spokesperson Eujin Byun said at a Geneva media briefing on Tuesday. 'If the conflict continues in Sudan, … we expect thousands more people will continue to flee, putting regional and global stability at stake.' Sudan shares a border with Chad, South Sudan, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, the Central African Republic and Libya. In addition to refugees who have left the country, about 10.5 million people have been displaced internally in Sudan, according to UN estimates. Patrice Dossou Ahouansou, a UNHCR official, said 800,000 of the refugees have arrived in Chad, where their shelter conditions are dire due to funding shortages with only 14 percent of funding appeals met. 'This is an unprecedented crisis that we are facing. This is a crisis of humanity. This is a crisis of … protection, based on the violence that refugees are reporting,' he said. The war has been raging in Sudan between its military and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group. In recent months, the violence has been intensifying in the western region of Darfur, where the RSF has been besieging the city of el-Fasher, compounding hunger in the area. A World Food Programme (WFP) and UNICEF aid convoy delivering food to el-Fasher came under attack this week, according to the UN's children's aid agency. 'We have received information about a convoy with WFP and UNICEF trucks being attacked last night while positioned in Al Koma, North Darfur, waiting for approval to proceed to el-Fasher,' UNICEF spokesperson Eva Hinds said on Tuesday. Sudan has seen growing instability since longtime President Omar al-Bashir was removed from power in 2019 after months of antigovernment protests. In October 2021, the Sudanese military staged a coup against the civilian government of Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, leading to his resignation in early 2022. Sudan's army chief, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and rival Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, who leads the RSF, had shared power after the coup but then started fighting for control of the state and its resources in April 2023.
Al Jazeera
3 days ago
- Al Jazeera
The Rwanda-DRC peace deal must include the voices of the voiceless
More than three decades after the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda plunged the African Great Lakes region into unprecedented turmoil, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) continue to struggle in establishing collaborative and neighbourly relations for the collective benefit of their peoples. Following the genocide, in which approximately 800,000 people were killed in just 100 days, hundreds of thousands of Rwandans – including some members of the defeated Rwandan armed forces and militias responsible for the genocide – crossed into the DRC and settled in refugee camps in the country's east, close to the Rwanda border. This became a security concern for the new government in Rwanda. The eastern DRC has not seen peace since. In 1996, the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire (AFDL), a coalition of Rwandan, Ugandan, Burundian, and some Congolese dissidents, launched a war against the government of Zaire. The AFDL, primarily a Congolese movement against the Zaire leadership but receiving significant support from the governments of Rwanda and Uganda, ousted President Mobutu Sese Seko and brought Laurent-Desire Kabila to power. However, this change in government and the brutal dismantling of Hutu refugee camps that accompanied it did not usher in meaningful intra-governmental collaboration or an end to Rwanda's security concerns. Over the subsequent decades, Rwanda's government continued to monitor the perpetual conflict in the eastern DRC, citing concerns about dissidents based there. According to United Nations reports, since 2012, this involvement has included direct support for the M23 rebel group waging an uprising against the DRC government. In January 2025, following numerous UN reports confirming Rwanda's support for M23, the DRC government severed diplomatic ties with Rwanda. Subsequently, Rwanda's development partners imposed sanctions on the country, some of its officials, and the Gasabo Gold Refinery, requesting Rwanda to halt support for M23 immediately and withdraw its troops from DRC territory. For the benefit of Rwanda, the DRC, and the entire region, the conflict in the eastern DRC and the decades-old tensions between the two neighbouring governments need to come to an end. As someone deeply invested in delivering democracy and development to all Rwandans, I have long called on the Rwandan government to engage in positive diplomacy to resolve its differences with the DRC government. Rwanda must engage in such diplomacy to overcome its structural constraints to development as a small, landlocked country with limited natural resources. If it resolves its issues with its neighbour, Rwanda could finally achieve true regional integration, participate in lucrative regional supply chains, and become a dependable partner to the wider international community. The peace deal the United States is currently attempting to broker between Rwanda and the DRC could put Kigali on the path to achieving all these gains. However, certain conditions are necessary for any peace deal between the DRC and Rwanda to be effective. As many have suggested, I agree that only a peace deal supported by a bilateral mineral cooperation incentive, guaranteed by a global power like the US – which would help control competition for natural resources – has a chance of succeeding. After all, there is little doubt that illicit trading of minerals has been used to finance the conflict in the eastern DRC. Yet this dark trade is not the fundamental cause of the conflict, and its cessation alone cannot resolve the issues between the two neighbours. The root cause of the eastern DRC conflict is, in fact, a lack of good governance and robust democracy across the African Great Lakes region. Lack of democracy, justice, and respect for human rights, coupled with social and economic exclusion, has caused Rwandans who survived the brutal dismantling of Hutu refugee camps not to return to Rwanda, and others to leave the country to seek refuge in regional states. Some Congolese have also made their way to Rwanda, escaping war, persecution and exclusion. According to the most recent figures by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, there are still more than 200,000 Rwandan refugees in the DRC and close to 83,000 Congolese refugees in Rwanda. There are more Congolese refugees in other regional states, such as Uganda, which hosts more than 600,000 of them. Some of these refugees have been enrolled in armed groups. All this has enabled power holders to abuse their authority and create chaos in the eastern DRC. While illicit trading of minerals has financed the conflict, the fundamental cause of the violence remains the lack of good governance and the inability or unwillingness of authorities to address the core concerns of refugees – the reasons why they sought refuge in either Rwanda or the DRC, and why they do not want to return to their countries of origin. The US can help address this problem and bring sustainable calm to the region by including a condition in the peace deal it is currently brokering that requires the Rwandan and Congolese governments to engage in direct dialogue with their respective opposition – both within and outside their borders – as well as with refugees, and commit to achieving good governance based on political inclusiveness, respect for human rights, and the rule of law. This would enable the voluntary and dignified return of refugees to their countries of origin and could finally put an end to the decades of chaos in the eastern DRC. Rwanda does not even need US pressure to embark on the path of positive diplomacy and dialogue, as a continuous quest for solutions through dialogue is one of the fundamental requirements of its constitution. The Rwandan opposition has already expressed its eagerness to enter into such constructive dialogue with the government. Four years ago, in June 2021, we submitted to the Rwandan government a roadmap for a promising future, officially requesting an inter-Rwandan dialogue to be organised. Similar efforts are under way in the DRC. Opposition figures in the country have recently called for an inter-Congolese dialogue to resolve internal governance issues. It is high time for Rwanda and the DRC to engage in dialogue with their respective refugees and opposition members, both within and outside their countries. This will ensure not only the long-term success of a Washington-brokered peace deal but also lead to trust-building between state officials on both sides and pave the way for true regional cooperation, which will help both nations prosper after finally achieving peace. The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial stance.
