Five offensives were launched in the Kivu region of the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) between 2009 and 2012 by the Armed Forces of the DRC (FARDC) with logistical support from the United Nations Mission (MONUC). Three offensives were directed against the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), one of which was a joint operation with the Rwandan Defence Force (RDF) that also targeted elements of the National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP). Two offensives targeted the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF). The campaign weakened the FDLR and the ADF but did not achieve their objective of eliminating them. An agreement was reached to integrate the CNDP into the FARDC in 2009, but it broke down in 2012 when some former CNDP members mutinied, formed the March 23 Movement (M23), and began a rebellion.
The eastern DRC remained unstable since the end of the Second Congo War in 2003 because of Laurent Nkunda's Rwandan-backed CNDP rebels challenging President Joseph Kabila's government. Nkunda claimed that he was protecting Congolese Tutsis from the Rwandan Hutu FDLR extremists, which he said were supported by the Kabila government, but both groups committed widespread atrocities against civilians, as did the FARDC. When the FARDC's unsuccessful offensive against the CNDP between August and October 2008 nearly led to the fall of the North Kivu provincial capital Goma, the United States and other international actors arranged negotiations between the governments of Kabila and Rwandan President Paul Kagame. On 5 December 2008, the DRC and Rwanda announced plans to launch Operation Umoja Wetu ("Our Unity" in Swahili) as a joint offensive against the FDLR by their forces, and to start peace talks between the CNDP and the Kabila government. Kabila and Kagame reached an agreement on the arrest of Nkunda in return for an operation against the FDLR.
Umoja Wetu began on 20 January 2009 when RDF troops crossed the Congolese border into North Kivu. RDF columns assisted by FARDC brigades moved through the province and destroyed the FDLR's main bases near Kibua, Walikale Territory. However, the group dispersed its fighters into the forests and hills of North Kivu, and an attempt by the FARDC–RDF coalition to encircle and cause a mass surrender of the FDLR's command was unsuccessful. The operation was declared over on 25 February 2009, and temporarily reduced the group's capabilities, but it resumed attacks on civilians and on the FARDC a month after the end of Umoja Wetu. The FARDC, with logistical support from MONUC, launched another campaign against the FDLR known as Operation Kimia II ("Silence") on 2 March. Military action was expanded into South Kivu, which was where the group had moved its headquarters during Umoja Wetu. The 23 March 2009 agreement between the government and the CNDP led to the integration of the latter's members into the FARDC, and they were deployed in Kimia II.
Kimia II ended on 31 December 2009, after international and domestic criticism that the operations that year caused immense harm to civilians. The FDLR carried out reprisal attacks on civilians, and the FARDC was increasingly undisciplined after the integration former CNDP fighters. Although the FARDC–MONUC coalition destroyed several FDLR bases, it failed to dismantle the group's command structure. Operation Amani Leo ("Peace Today") was launched on 1 January 2010, during which MONUC imposed new conditions on the Congolese military in return for its support, as an effort to reduce human rights violations. But this had the effect of the FARDC undertaking most actions on its own, and the operation still failed to neutralize the radical core of FDLR fighters or the group's command. On 25 June 2010, after the ADF militia attacked a military camp, the FARDC began Operation Ruwenzori against the group, which lived in the Ruwenzori Mountains, with MONUC support. Despite some tactical successes, the operations did not prevent the FDLR or ADF from continuing reprisal attacks against civilians.
Rwanda deployed special forces troops into eastern Congo in February 2011. Although some senior FDLR officers were killed or captured, the group withdrew deeper into the country. The ADF also remained active. On 8 March 2012, the FARDC and MONUSCO announced Operation Radi Strike, also directed against the ADF. On 11 April 2012, Kabila declared the end of all combat operations in the east, which included both Amani Leo and Radi Strike, after the government's attempt to arrest Bosco Ntaganda and redeploy units of former CNDP fighters to other parts of the country caused a mutiny. The mutineers accused the government of breaking the 23 March agreement, and formed the March 23 Movement in May 2012.
Background The Second Congo War officially ended in 2003 with a ceasefire, the withdrawal of Rwandan and Ugandan troops from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and the creation of a transitional government to reunify the country. An integration process began to merge the warring parties—the Rally for Congolese Democracy–Goma (RCD–Goma), the Movement for the Liberation of the Congo (MLC), President Joseph Kabila's Congolese Armed Forces (FAC), and various Mai-Mai groups—into a new national army, the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (FARDC). However, fighting continued in the eastern DRC.
A group of Tutsi RCD officers led by Brigadier Laurent Nkunda felt that they had been marginalized during the DRC's political transition and refused to integrate, along with forces loyal to them. Goma, in the DRC's North Kivu province, became the base of RCD dissidents. When the transitional government appointed new ex-FAC regional commanders in South Kivu, some RCD officers refused to recognize them, and their dispute became violent in Bukavu in May 2004. Government forces killed Tutsi civilians during the fighting, who were perceived as a Rwandan fifth column. In response, Nkunda led his troops to capture Bukavu on 2 June 2004, who then committed indiscriminate atrocities against civilians. He withdrew on 11 June because of international pressure on the RCD and Rwanda, but after a massacre of Congolese Tutsis on 13 August, Nkunda claimed that a genocide was taking place.
Among the most significant armed groups present in the eastern DRC were the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), which were estimated to have from 6,000 to 6,500 fighters in late 2008. Led by members of the former Hutu government in Rwanda that had been involved in the Rwandan genocide in 1994, it was perceived by the current Rwandan government as both a political and economic threat. Its presence in the DRC had been one of the reasons for Rwanda's invasions during the First and Second Congo Wars between 1996 and 2003, and those conflicts were also used by Rwanda to establish coordinated exploitation of the DRC's mineral wealth. The FDLR were used by the Congolese government to fight Rwandan and Rwandan-backed rebel forces.
After the 2006 general election created a political structure in North Kivu that was unfavorable for the RCD, Rwanda gave its permission for local Tutsi leaders to support Nkunda, who established the National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP) on 30 December 2006. Nkunda's forces had previously launched attacks against the FDLR that resulted in many civilian casualties, leading to retaliatory attacks by the FDLR that also killed civilians, and he decided to expand his "crusade" by creating the CNDP. Nkunda's actions caused increased tension across the eastern DRC, from southern Ituri, through North and South Kivu, down to northern Katanga. The Congolese government issued an arrest warrant for Nkunda in September 2005, but initially pursued a strategy of appeasement during the FARDC's integration process. Nkunda consolidated his control over the 81st and 83rd Brigades of the former RCD, and recruited or press ganged Congolese Tutsis. The CNDP grew into one of the most powerful armed groups in the DRC, partly due to Rwandan support.
Nkunda stated that his goal was to protect Congolese Tutsis by fighting against the FDLR, which he claimed was supported by the Kabila government. Pro-government forces saw Nkunda and the CNDP as defending Rwandan interests. There were multiple clashes and negotiations between the Kabila government and the CNDP between 2006 and 2008. The FARDC had launched a total of five offensives against the group since 2004. As of January 2008, at least 800,000 people were internally displaced in North Kivu and another 100,000 in South Kivu, more than at any time since 2003, and the region's population continued to suffer from atrocities, including sexual violence. Various peace efforts culminated in the Nairobi agreement on 7 November 2007 between the DRC and Rwanda, for the disarmament of the FDLR and repatriation of its members, and the Goma agreement between the government and a collection of armed groups, including the CNDP, on 23 January 2008. The terms of the Goma agreement were based on the integration of rebels with the government, the restoration of state authority, and the return of refugees.
However, by June 2008 the agreement was breaking down, with at least 190 ceasefire violations recorded by the United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC) since the Goma conference. The Congolese government wanted to make use of other militia groups to weaken the CNDP, and fighting was breaking out between several of them. But the CNDP's main concern was that the government, including Kabila and National Assembly speaker Vital Kamerhe, refused to pass a sweeping amnesty for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the rebels. The government did not want to encourage impunity, and these crimes were also the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Nkunda's top commander Bosco Ntaganda already had an ICC warrant. There were also disagreements between the DRC and Rwanda on which FDLR members were genocidaires that had to be repatriated, and the FARDC was believed to not have the military capability to fully defeat the group.
Prelude After the DRC made another commitment to disarm the FDLR in the Nairobi agreement, on 15 January 2008 the Congolese government gave the group an ultimatum to do so before 15 March. Minister of Defense and Veterans Chikez Diemu said that after the deadline they would be disarmed by force. FARDC chief of staff Lt. Gen. Dieudonné Kayembe and MONUC commander Lt. Gen. Babacar Gaye began planning a military operation against the FDLR in late November 2007. Kayembe met with Rwandan Defence Force (RDF) chief of staff Gen. James Kabarebe on 16 March 2008, and they agreed to not provide assistance to groups that undermine either state, referring to the FDLR and the CNDP. On 21 April, the FARDC launched Operation Kimia with the support of MONUC, attacking FDLR positions in the Rutshuru Territory. The peace agreement with the CNDP had completely broken down by August, and the FARDC launched its sixth offensive against the CNDP on 28 August, which eventually ended Operation Kimia.