Uganda deploys troops against anti-govt militias in east DRC

Kampala – Uganda’s army on Tuesday said it had deployed troops in the town of Bunia in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo to fight local militias.

The move came as the Rwanda-backed M23 armed group has been seizing territory further south in the neighbouring North and South Kivu provinces.

“We have deployed our troops in Bunia,” Ugandan military spokesperson Felix Kulayigye told AFP.

“There were massacres being committed by some militia groups and we agreed with our Congolese counterparts to carry out joint operations to save lives.”

Bunia is the capital of Ituri province, where Uganda already had thousands of troops, working primarily alongside DRC forces against an Islamist group, the Allied Democratic Forces, that has been linked to the Islamic State group.

But in the highly complex dynamics of the war-torn region, Uganda has also been accused, by UN experts and others, of working against DRC interests by supporting the M23 and controlling some of the region’s valuable mining interests.

Uganda has strongly denied the accusations.

The head of Uganda’s armed forces, Muhoozi Kainerugaba, on Saturday threatened to attack militias in Bunia unless they surrendered.

“I’m giving exactly 24 hours for all forces in Bunia to surrender their arms! If they don’t we shall consider them enemies and attack them,” Kainerugaba posted on X.

Kainerugaba is known for inflammatory social media posts that have included threats to invade neighbours Kenya and Sudan, though he claims some of his messages are meant in jest.

Analysts fear that the latest escalation of violence in eastern DRC could lead to a repeat of the situation in 1998 when Uganda and Rwanda backed rebel groups in the region.

That triggered what became known as the Second Congo War that lasted until 2003, drawing in multiple African countries and resulting in millions of deaths from violence, disease and starvation.