Security in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Rupa Huq Excerpts

Wednesday 4th September 2024 Westminster Hall

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered security in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Dr Huq, and I am pleased to introduce this debate on the issue of security, in its widest sense, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. I am very grateful to many groups and people who have sent me information and advice ahead of it. I am delighted to see the Minister in her place; I congratulate her on her appointment and look forward to her reply. I am not totally aware of how many colleagues wish to speak, but I will try to ensure that my speech is sufficiently short so that everyone is able to get in.

[Dr Rupa Huq (in the Chair)]

I think we have a fair amount of time. Two Back Benchers wish to speak and then there are the Front Benchers.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

Okay.

First of all, the DRC is almost the largest country in Africa and it certainly has the largest amount of unexploited mineral resources. The sale of mineral wealth could have made it an incredibly wealthy place by now, but it is not. It is a desperately poor and divided country. It has been my pleasure to visit the DRC on two occasions: once as an election observer in 2006 and another time on a human rights delegation to Goma and elsewhere in the east of the country, where I met many women victims of rape, which was being used as a weapon of war.

The history of the Congo is long, brutal, sad and complicated. It was not taken as a European colony until the mid-nineteenth century, when Belgium—or rather King Leopold—took over in 1885 as a result of the Congress of Berlin, which divided up Africa in the interests of European powers. The Congolese people were not represented in any way there; they were merely chattels to be fought over by the rival European powers. For the next 20 years, Leopold ran the country as his own personal fiefdom in the most brutal manner possible, and there were the most appalling abuses of human rights, with enforced rubber collectors and enforced miners, as well as the continuation of the slave trade, which had gone on for certainly the previous two centuries.

The atrocities were eventually recognised globally, partly through the work of Sir Roger Casement, a British diplomat who was later executed for his part in the Easter Rising in Ireland, and of E. D. Morel, a shipping clerk in Liverpool who observed what was going on through his company Elder Dempster. The latter eventually became a Labour MP and a Minister in the Labour Government of 1922. Before that, the global objections to Leopold’s excesses were such that the Belgian Parliament effectively nationalised the Congo and took it for itself, and it was then run as a Belgian colony until its independence in 1960. During that time, Belgian mining companies made an enormous amount of money out of the Congo and did not invest very much in its infrastructure other than in railways to take the minerals to the sea and in shipping lines to take other minerals, timber and other products down the rivers. It was very much an exploitative and extractive economy.

On independence in 1960, Patrice Lumumba became the Prime Minister and made a very strong declaration of independence, including at the United Nations, but he was assassinated a few months later. The country then deteriorated into a degree of war, with the involvement of both big powers—the Soviet Union and the United States; it almost became a cold war by proxy. The background is pretty bad all around. There is not time to go into all of the history of the Congo, but I want to set the scene, with that as the background to all of the other Governments since 1961—Mobutu and others: the huge corruption that went with those and, all the time, the continuing poverty of many of the Congolese people.

The country now faces devastating levels of insecurity. Since 1996, some 6 million people have been killed in conflicts in the Congo. Just think about that figure again: 6 million have died since 1996. That is barely mentioned; we would have to dig hard to find any reference to the Congo in most of the world’s media.

Issues of illegal mining and mass displacement continue, with more than 7 million people being displaced in the eastern region alone. There are also endemic diseases such as mpox, malaria, tuberculosis and cholera, and the limited hospitals and health services are overwhelmed. There is food insecurity, malnutrition, gender-based violence, and a lack of access to clean water and necessities. There are very large numbers of refugees, either internally displaced or in Angola or other neighbouring countries.

We are looking at a very serious situation. There are more than 100 armed groups fighting for control of natural resources in the eastern region, most notably the M23 movement—Mouvement du 23 mars—which is financially backed by and has received training from Rwanda and other Governments. More than a third of the children of the Congo have no school to go to.

That is the background, which I wanted to summarise before I go into more detail. I will take a quote from Adam Hochschild’s brilliant book, “King Leopold’s Ghost”:

“On the whole continent, perhaps no nation has had a harder time than the Congo in emerging from the shadow of its past.”

He wrote that some time ago, but it still applies today. We have issues to deal with, with the conflict that got worse and was heightened during the Rwanda genocide of 1994.

Basically, the DRC is both blessed and cursed with an abundance of natural resources. That includes cobalt, coltan, diamonds, copper, tin and gold, as well as the other, more obvious natural resource of vast amount of timber from one of the world’s largest and most pristine rainforests. I once took a flight from Goma to Kinshasa, and we were flying seemingly for hours just over forest. It is incredibly beautiful—pristine and beautiful—but then we look underneath it and we see the levels of poverty and malnutrition. I think the Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for West Worcestershire (Dame Harriett Baldwin), has probably also taken the same journey and had the same experiences.

The minerals taken from the Congo are the main factor in the present conflict. Congo has 70% of the world’s cobalt reserves. Cobalt is essential to almost every lithium-ion rechargeable battery, such as those used in phones and laptops, as well as in innovations such as solar power, which we see as necessary to deal with climate change. Therefore, our mobile phones and so much else are actually run with minerals that come from the Congo. In fact, much of the western economy simply could not work without the minerals that the Congo is forced to export. The armed rebel groups that have terrorised much of the country are actually usually involved in the mineral trade in some way or another. We have to face up to these issues.

Only two days ago, for example, the Congolese Government buried 200 internally displaced people who had died in various camps around Goma in North Kivu. They died in different circumstances, usually from hunger and diseases, but sometimes from violence. There has been heavy fighting between the Congolese army and the armed groups and the World Health Organisation has now declared mpox an epidemic in Africa.

A brief ceasefire in the summer was extended until August. There are, however, allegations of violations, and the situation in North Kivu remains very volatile indeed. The continuation of the ceasefire agreement signed in Luanda under Angola’s auspices, between the DRC and Rwanda, is significant. I hope the Minister will be able to shed some light on the possibility of that ceasefire being made permanent and of the establishment of an accountable force that could control what is at present a dangerous situation.

The resolution also authorised the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo to continue operating in the eastern DRC, where it has been for quite a long time. Although the UN missions in the Congo have a rather chequered history, and are not universally popular there, most people recognise that without a UN mission life would be even worse than it is at present. This is the country that has suffered the worst sexual violence in war of almost any country in the world—a terrible thing to have to say. The number of victims of sexual violence is absolutely huge.

I have never forgotten arriving in Goma on a human rights visit with a colleague from Parliament. We arrived in the evening; it was more or less dark when we got there. We went to a refugee centre that was entirely populated by women who were victims of rape. They said, “Thank you for coming. It is great you are here. You are welcome. Thank you for telling the world about the plight we are in. Can you now give a speech to us?” What on earth can a western European man say to a meeting of 500 or 1,000 women, all of whom were victims of rape and many of whom had been made pregnant because of the rape they had suffered? What can we say to them other than that we want to give them all the support and comfort possible and try to understand the horror of their situation? Rape is being used as a weapon of war.

The health concerns are serious and getting worse. As Ebola, mpox, covid and others have shown, health concerns are impossible to isolate. If one part of the world suffers from a serious contagious disease, every part of the world is at risk because of the levels of transport and communication we now have. It is in everybody’s interest to provide healthcare and health support to the people of the Congo to get through the epidemics that they are facing. An act of charity it may be; an act of necessity it certainly is.

I turn to the future. Education in the Congo for most children is non-existent. For those who can get to schools, the schools are very limited. For many years the teachers have been paid sometimes, but sometimes not. Most of the education is done via the Church, but many children are simply not receiving any education at all. Again, that is in a country with vast mineral resources through which vast profits are being made all around the world. Those children are not getting an education, and too many become involved in the next thing I will talk about: illegal mining and the export of its products.

Conveniently, the products of the illicit and illegal mining in the Congo miraculously appear in another country, such as Rwanda or somewhere else. Those products are bought by global mining corporations, such as Glencore and others, and then appear on the world market, ending up in our mobile phones and batteries. Children as young as five are often forced to work in brutal conditions. In his very good book, “Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives”, Siddharth Kara writes:

“As of 2022, there is no such thing as a clean supply chain of cobalt from the Congo. All cobalt sourced from the DRC is tainted by various degrees of abuse, including slavery, child labour, forced labour, debt bondage, human trafficking, hazardous and toxic working conditions, pathetic wages, injury and death, and incalculable environmental harm.”

I advise anyone interested in the Congo to read the two books I have mentioned: Hochschild’s book “King Leopold’s Ghost” and Kara’s book on cobalt.

Al Jazeera recently published an article, “Blood and minerals: Who profits from conflict in DRC?” Its writers managed to speak to miners, a trafficker, an undertaker and a prostitute to understand the way of life in the mineral region. I will read from it. A 16-year-old miner called Inocence walked an hour to the largest coltan mine post in the country. As he was guiding the journalists to the mine post, they encountered several men carrying the body of a miner on a makeshift stretcher. Inocence told journalists,

“Sometimes the mountain caves in. The miners are buried for ever and people forget about them.”

The trafficker later explained that many miners work for 14 hours a day and get paid only about $1. The trafficker collects his merchandise from the miners by the river and goes on to sell the goods, earning around $2,000 a month. Traffickers who buy already screened minerals at the foot of the mine end up multiplying its value when they leave it at the border with Rwanda and Uganda. By the time the coltan arrives in the manufacturing districts of Shanghai, Ciudad Juárez in Mexico or other places around the world, the market price is between $470 and $540 per kilo. So we can see the multiplier effect: a child gets almost nothing to mine those vital products, which end up on the world market where they sell for enormous amounts of money.

Mining companies such as Glencore, which is based in Switzerland, have exploited the conflict for their own benefit. It was recently found guilty under Swiss law of “inadequate organisation” that led to corrupt mining deals, which included the bribing of officials. Public Eye filed a criminal complaint with the Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland following the publication of the Paradise papers, which shed new light on the purchase of cobalt and copper mines in the DRC.

Glencore commissioned the services of a businessman, Dan Gertler, who is on the US sanctions list, to secure favourable mining deals. He brought about a staggering price reduction on behalf of Glencore in 2008 during negotiations with Kabila’s Government about the Katanga Mining company, and in 2011 acquired shares in the Mutanda and Kansuki mines from the Congolese state mining company at far below their market value. Four years of investigation by the OAG found that around $26 million had been paid from Swiss bank accounts to a close associate of the then President of the DRC. Glencore ultimately benefited financially from the deals, as the OAG’s judgment states.

Glencore had been ordered to pay $150 million, which is nothing compared with the loss that the Congolese people have suffered. There needs to be much sterner action taken by all Governments globally concerning this horrifying supply chain of vital minerals, which are mined at the expense of the living conditions and poverty of many people in the Congo, and could provide so much in the way of education and so much more for other people in the Congo.

The purpose of my debate today is to try to draw attention to the history of the Congo and the plight that many people are suffering at present, and to try to hear what the new UK Government’s view is on this and how we can take matters forward. The UN is involved, endorsing Security Council resolution 2717 in 2023, and experts are concerned that if MONUSCO withdraws, key components of early warning systems of human rights violations will no longer be operational, significantly limiting human rights monitoring, reporting and investigation. The UN has asked the Congolese Government to ensure the consolidation of the handover of security responsibilities in South Kivu. I hope those assurances will be forthcoming.

Lack of logistical and military support for troops and groups to defeat the M23 is hampering efforts. We have huge investment in groups in order to make other people very, very wealthy indeed. The role of the Rwandan Government, in facilitating M23 activities, has also been called into question. What action is going to be taken?

I will conclude with one point and a couple of questions. The UK ambassador to the Congo, James Kariuki, said in a statement to the UN Security Council only a few months ago in April,

“We also emphasise our commitment to a gradual, responsible and sustainable withdrawal. We call on the DRC government, through close coordination with MONUSCO, to assume its protection responsibilities for the civilian population in line with the joint disengagement plan.”

Can the Government elaborate on how they will emphasise this commitment to a sustainable withdrawal? While we have condemned the continued advance of UN-sanctioned M23 forces, external actors must withdraw as well, because they are part of the problem.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

It is to the bedevilment of the Congo that so many proxy groups turn up there to benefit from mineral exploitation, and it is the people of the Congo who suffer. Wherever they come from, they are wrong, they should not be there and they should go. I am absolutely clear about that.

I would like to ask some questions of the Government. What relationship do they have with the Rwandan Government, and what pressure are they putting on them? Are they able to increase humanitarian aid to the DRC, particularly in relation to education of both girls and boys? I know that priority was given to girls’ education by the Department for International Development, which is now part of the Foreign Office. I supported that, but I also made the point that if we want the next generation of boys to grow up and not commit the appalling sexual violence of their parents’ generation and previous male generations, they need education as well. It is not just girls who need to be educated but boys too. What support are we able to give to MONUSCO and the important work it does there?

I would like to finish by saying,

“The legacy of injustice can only be erased through the pursuit of truth and reconciliation.”

That is another quote from Adam Hochschild. Volker Türk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, has said:

“The insecurity is being fuelled by a seemingly impassable mountain of challenges: from large-scale corruption, to the unbridled race between multiple parties to take control and exploit the country’s wealth of natural resources, to ongoing violent land disputes.”

I will finish at this point, because I think I have taken up too much time, but I hope I managed to set out my concerns about the DRC.

[Dr Rupa Huq (in the Chair)]

It is not a question of time; the right hon. Gentleman was completely within his rights, but we do have at least one vote in the House—we think two.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Development (Anneliese Dodds)]

It is a real pleasure to take part in this important debate with you in the Chair, Dr Huq. I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) for securing what has been a very important and rich debate. I thank everybody who has taken part in it.

This debate has global significance, and it has direct significance for those living in our country whose family and friends have been impacted by the concerning situation. I know that that is particularly the case for my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton and Winchmore Hill (Kate Osamor) and the right hon. Member for Islington North.

The security situation in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo is dire and deserves our attention. The right hon. Member for Islington North was absolutely right to say that it has received insufficient global attention. It is very rare that one sees coverage of this issue, unfortunately, in the UK media. When one looks at the figures, which many speakers have detailed, that is surprising. More than 7 million people have been displaced, and more than 23 million people are in need. Ultimately, the DRC is facing one of the world’s most severe humanitarian crises.

The new Government are determined to ensure that the UK will play its part, and I am going to talk about how we are determined to do that in the remainder of my remarks. Of course, I acknowledge that that is against the backdrop of previous Government activity, as the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for West Worcestershire (Dame Harriett Baldwin), rightly referred to. Overall, the UK has contributed a £114 million humanitarian programme for the eastern DRC that is delivering life-saving emergency assistance right now to people in need.

In the context of our commitment to building lasting partnerships with African countries, it is critical that we continue our engagement with the issues that we have been talking about in this debate. Some questions were asked about our ODA contribution and the continuation of that, as well as about the role of BII. That has been significant and there are some exciting developments that show the potential that was referred to. I am sure Members will understand that those decisions are kept under review. I very much heard Members’ representations on this, but we have a spending review coming up, as I am sure Members will understand.

On the specific issues that were raised around conflict prevention, I underline that that is one of our top priorities as a new Government. That includes fostering peace and supporting mediation efforts in the DRC and the wider great lakes region. I was grateful to hear about the shadow Minister’s visits to the DRC when she was in her previous role. She is clearly passionate about these issues. The new Government have been determined to engage as much as possible.

I am grateful to the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for Honiton and Sidmouth (Richard Foord), for acknowledging the fact that Lord Collins has been in the DRC. He has also been to Angola, and he is currently in Rwanda. I hope that demonstrates the significance of our commitment. While in Rwanda, Lord Collins met President João Lourenço to discuss Angola’s pivotal role in mediating peace in the DRC. He congratulated the President on his recent successful efforts to negotiate a ceasefire, which have been referred to by other Members. Across the region, Lord Collins has encouraged all parties not only to fulfil their obligations under that ceasefire agreement, but to respect it in spirit, not just in letter, and to continue to seek to find ways to build on that progress to bring lasting peace. He has conveyed that message right across the countries that he has been present in. That is the regional engagement that my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton and Winchmore Hill also asked about.

I thank the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) for his kind words. He talked about the need for broader regional engagement, and he is right about a whole range of countries being involved. He mentioned South Africa, but other nations in Africa are deeply concerned about the situation. The instability is having a broader regional impact. There is also the African Union. I know that Lord Collins is keen to ensure that we use those relationships to, as I said, try to bring the lasting peace that is the right of the people of the DRC.

While recent steps have been encouraging, we cannot lose sight of the conflict’s history. As has been mentioned, it has persisted for almost 30 years, but the escalations of violence that we have seen over the last two years have been particularly concerning. The UK Government strongly condemn the actions of all armed groups, including the UN-sanctioned M23 and the Forces démocratiques de libération du Rwanda—the FDLR—and I reiterate the UK’s support for the regionally led Nairobi peace process and the Luanda peace process.

Peacekeeping was also referred to. It is a crucial part of international efforts to promote peace in the eastern DRC, and MONUSCO plays a vital role in protecting civilians. The UK has deployed three military staff officers to support MONUSCO’s planning and performance, and contributed £48 million to its budget in the last financial year under the previous Government. However, MONUSCO is operating in very challenging circumstances. The shadow Minister referred to attacks on peacekeepers and UN property, which she described as despicable. We certainly share that assessment; they are unacceptable. To answer the question about what actions are being taken, the UK is continuing to push for accountability and responsibility for those who have conducted those despicable acts.

We also recognise the importance of regionally-led peacekeeping initiatives. As such, last month, the UK supported the adoption of a UN Security Council resolution that mandated limited targeted support from MONUSCO to the Southern African Development Community mission in the DRC. We will continue to work closely with MONUSCO and UN Security Council member states to alleviate the conflict and its appalling humanitarian consequences. On the issue of withdrawal, we will continue to work closely with the DRC Government towards a condition-based withdrawal that ensures a smooth transition and, above all, the protection of civilians.

I want to be absolutely clear: ultimately, it is a political response, not a military one, that will deliver the peace that is so desperately needed. As I said, Lord Collins has been urging all sides to engage particularly with the Luanda process and deliver on the commitments made already. The impacts of the conflict on civilians are widespread and devastating. The shadow Minister talked about the impact on humanitarian workers, which indeed has been dreadful, including some particularly concerning recent instances. Our solidarity and sympathy go to the families of those affected. And, of course, conditions in the east increase the risk of sexual violence, malnutrition and disease.

The DRC has been hit by multiple life-threatening outbreaks in recent years. Ebola was mentioned, but there have also been outbreaks of cholera and measles. It is now also grappling with deeply concerning outbreaks of mpox across the country—particularly in the east, where the new strain emerged, and where displaced people, particularly children, as well as women and men, are living in appalling conditions. It is vital that the international community works together in this context to control the spread of the virus and save lives. That is why, while he was in the DRC, Lord Collins announced more than £3 million in funding to UNICEF to tackle the ongoing mpox and cholera outbreaks. I also assure hon. Members that the new Government have met with Dr Tedros—I have met him personally as the Minister for Development, as has the Foreign Secretary, and Lord Collins will be meeting him soon—including to talk about these issues.

The issue of those living in IDP camps was also mentioned. They have been subject to direct consequences of the conflict. The hon. Member for Honiton and Sidmouth rightly referred to the prevalence of sexual violence, which is very concerning for those in IDP camps. Disturbingly, we have also seen the bombing of IDP camps in May this year, which I condemn in the strongest terms. The UK has repeatedly raised the inviolability of camps in multilateral fora, and has consistently called for all parties to respect international humanitarian law, including by positioning heavy artillery away from camps.

I pay tribute to the invaluable work of humanitarian workers in this context, and I will briefly touch on their important role in delivering the food security that is so desperately needed, which was rightly referred to by the hon. Member for Strangford in his powerful and compassionate speech. The UK is signing a new agreement with the World Food Programme, committing a further £7 million to tackle food insecurity in the DRC, because we are aware of that need.

The subject of women and girls was rightly referred to many times. The DRC is a priority country because women and girls there face some of the highest rates of sexual violence in the world. The right hon. Member for Islington North stated that he met some of the survivors; the vivid picture he painted is one that others referred to and that I will remember. As an important global south partner on this agenda, the UK and the DRC have collaborated on action to tackle conflict-related sexual violence, including as members of the International Alliance on Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict, and partners under the platform for action promoting rights and wellbeing of children born of conflict-related sexual violence. It is particularly difficult for those children who have been born, for example, out of conflict-related rape.

We are determined to boost the resilience of civil society partners, as was raised by many Members. That includes ensuring that we are providing support to NGOs that are supporting survivors of sexual violence, particularly TRIAL International.

[Dr Rupa Huq (in the Chair)]

Order. The Clerk is telling me we need to pull the plug.

[Anneliese Dodds]

I will write to Members about the other issues that they raised. I am sorry that we ran out of time; the Division disturbed this debate. I am grateful to everyone for their participation.