FDLR communique released last week commended the deployment of armed forces from neighboring countries that will join FARDC, and it pledged its unreserved support to fight M23.
Any country that supports FDLR and its splinter groups operating in DRC will definitely have to know that this is a terrorist group that’s an offshoot of genocidaires that killed over a million during the 1994 Genocide Against the Tutsis in Rwanda. The FDLR has been declared a terrorist group by none other than UN. Therefore FDLR cannot cannot be treated as anything other than a terror group.
So far, two countries (South Africa and Burundi) have been mobilizing forces with an objective of helping DRC’s FARDC, to fight M23. While it is okay to clear DRC of hundreds of terror groups, it would be suspicious to think to fight M23 while ignoring a designated terror organization like FDLR.
As of now it is impossible to differentiate FARDC from FDLR because they have been in a longtime cohabitation, they are the same. Previously they collaborated to provoke Rwanda (by firing rockets into the her territory) in the name of fighting against M23 and they are yet to relent.
Rwanda, just like other keen observers have always maintained that military operations cannot solve DRC self-inflicted problems which are purely political and internal. Whether countries join FARDC/FDLR coalition to fight M23, it would be futile to ignore the real issues at hand.
Supporting genocidal organizations like FDLR, to destabilize Rwanda is something that Rwanda cannot take lightly. Rwanda’s stand on FDLR remains the same, it should be admonished, routed, disarmed, and its members handed over to stand before the courts of justice.
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