Hilde Vautmans, Abir Al‑Sahlani, Barry Andrews, Petras Auštrevičius, Malik Azmani, Dan Barna, Benoit Cassart, Olivier Chastel, Engin Eroglu, Karin Karlsbro, Ľubica Karvašová, Ilhan Kyuchyuk, Jan‑Christoph Oetjen, Urmas Paet, Marie‑Agnes Strack‑Zimmermann, Yvan Verougstraete, Sophie Wilmès, Lucia Yar
on behalf of the Renew Group
B10‑0125/2025
European Parliament resolution on the escalation of violence in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo
(2025/2553(RSP))
The European Parliament,
– having regard to its previous resolutions on the situation in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC),
– having regard to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and to other UN human rights treaties and instruments,
– having regard to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,
– having regard to the reports of the UN Group of Experts on the DRC,
– having regard to the recent statements of the UN Security Council,
– having regard to the recent statements by the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy on behalf of the EU on the latest escalation in the eastern DRC,
– having regard to the G7 Foreign Ministers’ Statement on the escalation of violence in the eastern DRC of 3 February 2025,
– having regard to Rule 136(2) of its Rules of Procedure,
A. whereas over the last two years, March 23 Movement (M23) forces have been expanding their presence in the eastern DRC; whereas they have been setting up new governance administrations and taxation systems, establishing military training camps and exporting minerals directly to Rwanda;
B. whereas on 23 and 24 January 2025, M23 fired on positions of the United Nations Organization Stabilisation Mission in the DRC (MONUSCO), which resulted in the deaths of 13 peacekeepers of MONUSCO and of the peacekeeping mission led by the Southern African Development Community (SADC);
C. whereas since the beginning of 2025, the eastern DRC has experienced a significant escalation in violence, leading to a dire humanitarian crisis, human rights violations and violation of its territorial integrity; whereas on 27 January 2025, clashes erupted in Goma between M23 and the Armed Forces of the DRC (FARDC) and their allies; whereas approximately 800 000 internally displaced people were sheltering at that time in densely populated displacement sites around the city;
D. whereas on 30 January, parts of Goma, including its airport, fell under the control of M23, which declared its intention to march all the way to Kinshasa; whereas in South Kivu, M23 forces continued their advance towards Bukavu and on 5 February captured Nyabibwe; whereas on 3 February, M23 declared a ‘ceasefire for humanitarian reasons’, but Goma airport is still closed and there is still no way for humanitarian aid to get through; whereas the partial occupation of Goma by M23 is having wide-ranging humanitarian consequences on civilians, who have no access to running water, electricity or the internet; whereas, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA), more than 3 000 people have died; whereas some have already been buried in mass graves, while others are currently in hospital morgues in and around Goma;
E. whereas on 8 February 2025, during the summit between SADC and the East African Community (EAC) in Tanzania, the leaders of 20 east and southern African countries called for an immediate ceasefire in the DRC; whereas they underscored the critical importance of safeguarding the country’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity and urged the establishment of humanitarian corridors to provide essential assistance to those affected by the ongoing conflict;
F. whereas the UN Group of Experts concluded in its June 2024 report that the deployment of the Rwanda Defence Force (RDF) ‘violates the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Democratic Republic of the Congo’ and that ‘RDF’s de facto control and direction over M23 operations also renders Rwanda liable for the actions of M23’;
G. whereas the crisis has reached Kinshasa, where embassies – including those of Rwanda, Belgium, France, the Netherlands and the US – have been attacked by protesters;
H. whereas women and girls in the DRC face increased levels of sexual and gender-based violence, resulting in there being one victim of rape every four minutes; whereas the staff of Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, which receives many survivors of sexual violence, is alarmed about the deteriorating security situation in the area and about the security of the staff and patients in Panzi Hospital itself;
I. whereas several humanitarian organisation warehouses containing food, medicines and medical supplies have been looted or destroyed during the fighting; whereas without the urgent reinforcement of resources, and given the security constraints limiting their movements, the capacity of humanitarian organisations to respond to the needs of the population remains severely compromised; whereas humanitarian access has been limited and remains alarming; whereas some international organisations have begun evacuating their non-essential staff and scaling down their activities due to the increased security risk;
J. whereas prior to recent developments, the DRC faced one of the largest displacement crises in Africa, with 6.7 million internally displaced persons, including 4.6 million in South and North Kivu; whereas the DRC also hosts over 520 000 refugees and asylum seekers from neighbouring countries, while 1.1 million refugees from the DRC are being hosted in neighbouring countries in the region, more than half of them in Uganda; whereas the recent surge in violence has internally displaced over half a million people since the beginning of the year; whereas given the severe overcrowding in the displacement sites where people remain and the lack of water, sanitation and hygiene infrastructure, the risk of a cholera outbreak is extremely high, along with that of a rapid spread of the Mpox epidemic;
K. whereas eastern Congo is rich in minerals, namely lithium, coltan, cobalt and zinc, which are resources essential to the economy, with use ranging from electronics to renewable energy infrastructure; whereas these minerals are being stolen by M23 and mined illegally, as confirmed by the UN Group of Experts, fuelling violence while destabilising global supply chains; whereas this affects not just the people of the DRC, but also the economic security of the EU and its industries, businesses and consumers;
L. whereas many of the displaced people will seek refuge in neighbouring countries and, potentially, in the EU;
M. whereas the further internationalisation of the conflict in the form of a direct military confrontation between the DRC and Burundi on one side, and Rwanda on the other side, and of a proxy war between African countries, is alarming;
N. whereas Rwanda is the third largest contributor of peacekeeping forces to the UN, for example through the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR);
O. whereas both the United Nations Security Council and the Peace and Security Council of the African Union called for emergency meetings in New York and Addis Ababa that took place on 28 January 2025;
P. whereas between 2021 and 2024, the EU provided EUR 260 million in funding to Rwanda, with an additional EUR 900 million pledged under the Global Gateway strategy; whereas a significant portion of this aid is earmarked for ‘good governance’, yet Rwanda’s actions are demonstrating the exact opposite;
Q. whereas following the latest developments in the eastern DRC, the EU declared that it stood ready to boost emergency assistance, particularly for the newly displaced populations in and around Goma, and on 28 January, the Commission announced new humanitarian support for the DRC, with an initial amount of EUR 60 million for 2025;
1. Strongly condemns the occupation of Goma and other territories in the eastern DRC by M23 and the RDF as an unacceptable breach of the DRC’s sovereignty and territorial integrity; urges M23 and the RDF to stop their advance and to withdraw immediately; condemns the serious human rights and international humanitarian law violations which have led to a mass displacement of civilians, resulting from the renewed hostilities involving M23, the FARDC and various other armed groups since late 2021;
2. Strongly condemns the indiscriminate attacks with explosive weapons in populated areas of North Kivu by all parties, including on displacement camps and other densely populated areas near Goma, as well as the unlawful killings, rapes and other apparent war crimes, forced labour, forced recruitment and other abusive practices committed by M23 with the support of the RDF and by the FARDC;
3. Strongly condemns the fact that the RDF has deployed troops to eastern Congo and provided direct military support to M23, helping it expand control in the eastern DRC;
4. Strongly condemns all attacks against diplomatic missions in Kinshasa; urges the authorities of the DRC to take all appropriate steps to protect diplomats and the premises of diplomatic missions, as is their responsibility in accordance with international law;
5. Calls for an immediate end to the violence, particularly the mass killings and the use of rape as a strategic weapon of war; calls on the DRC and Rwanda to investigate and appropriately prosecute those responsible for war crimes, including sexual violence, under the principle of command responsibility;
6. Calls for the immediate reopening of Goma airport; urges the RDF and M23 to urgently ensure access to and facilitate the delivery of humanitarian aid to the population of Goma in the eastern DRC, including by ensuring that civilians and displaced people are not denied access to items essential for their survival, such as water, food and medicine, and have access to legal, social and medical support for survivors of sexual violence;
7. Calls for humanitarian corridors to be immediately opened where appropriate and for principled humanitarian access to be enabled; calls for the safety of humanitarian staff, health workers and medical facilities to be preserved;
8. Urges the Rwandan and DRC Governments to end their military support for abusive non-state armed groups, including M23, which may make them complicit in war crimes;
9. Is concerned about the consequences of Russian interference in the conflict and more widely in the region;
10. Regrets that the EU has failed, since the re-emergence of M23 with Rwanda’s support, to take appropriate measures to sufficiently address the crisis and effectively press Rwanda to end its support for M23, and that it has instead taken steps, including the signature in February 2024 of a Memorandum of Understanding on sustainable critical raw materials value chains and the decision to top up support for Rwanda’s deployment in Mozambique under the European Peace Facility (EPF), which have failed to demonstrate sufficient safeguards and have contributed to the sending of an inconsistent message to the Rwandan authorities;
11. Urges the Commission and the Council to immediately suspend the EU-Rwanda Memorandum of Understanding on sustainable critical raw materials value chains until Rwanda proves that it is ceasing its interference and its exportation of minerals mined from M23-controlled areas; calls on all actors to increase transparency and to effectively ban the entry of all blood minerals into the EU;
12. Calls on the Commission, the EU Member States and the international financial institutions to freeze all bilateral assistance to Rwanda subject to it meeting conditions on, inter alia, humanitarian access and the breaking of all links with M23; urges the Commission and the EU Member States to freeze their military and security assistance to the RDF and the part of the Congolese armed forces collaborating with the M23 rebels, in order to ensure that they do not contribute directly or indirectly to abusive military operations in the eastern DRC; calls strongly, in particular, for a review of the EU’s renewed support under the EPF to ensure that troops deployed in northern Mozambique and benefiting from EPF support, as well as their commanders, have been properly vetted and have not been involved in human rights violations in the eastern DRC or elsewhere, with a view to suspending the support if it is found to contribute directly or indirectly to abusive military operations in the eastern DRC;
13. Urges the Commission and all EU Member States to ban the transfer of weapons to the Rwandan forces and M23 and to ensure greater transparency of trade in EU weapons;
14. Urges the Council to expand sanctions against senior M23 commanders, leaders of other armed groups and senior officials from Congo and Rwanda, including Major-General Eugene Nkubito, the commander of the RDF’s 3rd Division and Major-General Ruki Karusisi, RDF Special Force Commander, both identified in the June 2024 report of the UN Group of Experts and reports from other countries across the region as being responsible for or complicit in recent serious abuses by their forces or those for which they have command responsibility;
15. Calls on the International Criminal Court to step up its investigations into alleged crimes in the region so that the perpetrators are brought to justice;
16. Reiterates its full support for MONUSCO in protecting civilians and stabilising the region; calls on the UN to work towards a stronger mandate for MONUSCO in order to enable peacemaking; calls on the UN to ensure the protection of civilians and respect for international humanitarian law, particularly with the increased risk of gender-based violence, and to preserve the safety of humanitarian staff, health workers and medical facilities;
17. Calls on the UN to take immediate and specific measures to protect Panzi Hospital, its patients and staff;
18. Calls on the UN to use the peacekeeping partnerships with Rwanda, such as UNAMIR, to put pressure on the Rwandan authorities to stop the violence, instead of allowing them to use it as leverage to avoid sanctions;
19. Calls for the cancellation of the 2025 Road World Championships in Kigali if Rwanda does not change course;
20. Welcomes the special session of the UN Human Rights Council of 7 February 2025 on the human rights situation in the east of the DRC, supports the establishment of an independent commission of inquiry into serious violations committed since January 2022;
21. Takes note of the outcomes of the joint meeting of EAC-SADC Ministers, held on 7 February 2025, and the joint EAC-SADC summit of heads of state and government, held on 8 February 2025; welcomes the recommendations made;
22. Reaffirms its full support for the African-led Luanda and Nairobi peace processes as a path to resolving the conflict;
23. Calls on the international community and all actors involved to use the Addis Ababa framework agreement and to organise an international conference for peace in eastern Congo and the Great Lakes region; stresses that this ‘peace for business’ conference will have the unique feature of having the private sector around the peace negotiation table, since the war is about strategic minerals; underlines that businesspeople can have significant leverage to push their countries to act for peace; believes that the business for peace approach can help us move forward in finding a solution;
24. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council, the Commission, the Vice-President of the Commission / High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, the Government and Parliament of Rwanda, the Government and Parliament of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the African Union and other relevant international bodies.
