A regional military force has removed almost a thousand Burundian soldiers from from DR Congo as part of a phased withdrawal, Burundi’s military said on Monday. The DR Congo government in Kinshasa has decided to not renew its mission, citing its ineffectiveness.
Commanders of the East African Community (EAC), the six-country partnership whose mandate in DR Congo ended on December 8, have already demobilized hundreds of South Sudanese and Kenyan soldiers, and more units will soon follow the Burundian forces.
In November 2022, around a year after the M23 (March 23 Movement) rebel forces occupied vast swaths of DR Congo’s North Kivu province, the EAC leadership, with Kinshasa’s permission, sent troops to the country’s violence-plagued east, to reclaim areas taken by M23.
There have been repeated demonstrations against the forces deployed in North Kivu’s capital, Goma. Many Congolese believe the EAC prefers military diplomacy over offensive tactics and that this has motivated armed groups like M23. The future of the mission was questioned after the protests.
In February, DR Congo’s president Felix Tshisekedi urged the EAC regional forces commander General Jeff Nyagah to take action.
At an EAC summit last month the organization revealed that DR Congo was not renewing the regional force’s mandate beyond December 8. In order to fill the gap, Kinshasa has been relying on troops from the Southern African Development Community (SADC).
On Sunday, Burundi National Defence Force spokesman Colonel Floribert Biyereke said, according to AFP, that “all the soldiers in this battalion arrived in Burundi.”
Ugandan troops also form part of the East African army’s mission in DR Congo, alongside Kenyan, South Sudanese and Burundian soldiers, and they are expected to leave in the coming weeks.