Congo's Long War

(Condensed version of this article from TIME Magazine)

Introduction

1. In Congo, a nation of 63 million people in the heart of Africa, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) estimates that 3.9 million people have died from war-related causes since the conflict in Congo began in 1998, making it the world's most lethal conflict since World War II.
2. Yet Congo's troubles rarely make daily news headlines, and the country is often low on international donors' lists of places to help.
3. Congo represents the promise of Africa as much as its misery: Its soils are packed with diamonds, gold, copper, tantalum (known locally as coltan and used in electronic devices such as cell phones and laptop computers) and uranium. The waters of its mighty river could one day power the continent. Yet because Congo is so rich in resources, its problems, when left to fester, tend to suck its neighbors into a vortex of exploitation and chaos. And so fixing Congo is essential to fixing Africa.

Political History

1. After decades of often brutal foreign rule, first as the private possession of King Leopold II of Belgium and then as a Belgian colony, Congo won its independence in 1960.
   
2. But within months its first elected Prime Minister had been killed by Belgium- and U.S.-backed opponents because of his growing ties to the Soviet Union, an assassination that eventually opened the way for army general Mobutu Sese Seko to grab power.
   
3. A U.S. favorite during the cold war, Mobutu presided over one of the most corrupt regimes in African history, siphoning off billions from state-owned companies and allowing most of the country to languish.
   
4. In 1996 neighboring Rwanda and Uganda jointly invaded Congo to eliminate the Hutu militias, known as the Interahamwe, that had been responsible for the Rwandan genocide and were hiding in Congo's eastern forests.
   
5. As the invading armies advanced across the country, Mobutu fled, and the invaders installed a small-time rebel leader named Laurent Kabila as President.
6. But things got worse. In 1998, after Kabila got too friendly with the Interahamwe, Uganda and Rwanda invaded Congo again, triggering what became known as Africa's first world war.
   
7. The scramble for power and resources dragged in forces from at least eight African neighbors, spawned a myriad of Congolese factions and set off campaigns of ethnic cleansing.
   
8. Kabila, as nasty and corrupt as his predecessor, was shot dead by one of his bodyguards in 2001. His son Joseph, 29, assumed power. One year later, after some arm twisting by continental power South Africa (whose leaders recognize the crucial role Congo could play in their plan for an African rebirth), the young leader and most of the rebel groups and foreign forces in the country signed a peace deal.
   
9. A national army was formed, aimed at integrating soldiers who had previously been trying to kill one another. And the Congolese people, who maintain a sense of spirit and beauty despite the horrors around them, dared to hope for a better country.

Today

1. In the three years since then, some things in Congo have improved.
   
2. Mining firms have returned, and cell-phone companies are doing a booming business.
   
3. But in some parts of the country, the fighting has never really stopped. The U.N.'s peacekeeping force has got tougher in the past year, chasing rebels and apprehending or even killing them, but the force lacks the numbers to impose complete order.
   
4. Congolese troops who are supposed to be helping the U.N. peacekeepers have proved ineffective and corrupt and have been hampered by slow and often nonexistent wages.
5. The European Union is working on ensuring that salaries and rations get to Congo's soldiers, and there has been some improvement.
   
6. But corruption is still a big problem. A Western official in Kinshasa, Congo's capital, estimates that at least $3.2 million of the $8 million a month budgeted for Congo's military is stolen.
7. Frustrated and often hungry, Congolese units have taken to looting and pillaging the people they are meant to protect.
   
8. The upsurge in rapes, killings and torture by Congo's security forces has become so serious that the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Congo is debating whether to end its cooperation with the police and army altogether.
   
9. Congo's elections, set for July 30, have become both the great hope for and the great threat to the country's recovery.
   
10. It can take four or five days to travel 50 miles by road. The country's main artery remains the snaking Congo River, which is full of treacherous sandbars and shifting currents.
    
11. The country "hasn't had a census since 1984. There are no ID cards in memory. We will need at least 40,000 to 50,000 polling stations," says William Lacy Swing, veteran U.S. ambassador in Africa and head of the U.N. peacekeeping mission to Congo.
    
12. He says the poll will cost $422 million. "Elections should be a time of national unity and reconciliation. But if it is not handled correctly, it can be a moment of great division."

Closing

Is the world willing to see it through? The shame of indifference should be reason enough for action. But without more money from the developed world to help rebuild, without more troops to secure the peace and protect innocent civilians, without a genuine effort by Congo's leaders to work for the country rather than just their part of it and without Congo's neighbors ending their meddlesome ways, Africa's broken heart is unlikely to heal. In 10 years' time, you may be reading another story much like this one. The only difference will be that millions more people will have died.