Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) President Félix Tshisekedi has chosen to attend the 61st Munich Security Conference in Germany as his country faces a Western-backed conflict over natural resources that has internally displaced 700,000 people since January. A tweet from the official presidential account on 13 February confirmed his arrival in Munich, where global leaders plan to tackle global security challenges over three days.

Tshisekedi’s presence in Germany means he’ll be absent for the 38th African Union (AU) Summit scheduled for 15-16 February in Addis Ababa, which includes a meeting of the AU’s Peace and Security Council focused on the ongoing crisis in eastern DRC. His communications team informed news agency Agence France-Presse that Prime Minister Judith Suminwa would represent him.

Continued….. This isn’t the first time Tshisekedi has skipped significant regional meetings. He missed the East African Community (EAC) virtual summit on 29 January. On 8 February, he again was a no-show at a crucial meeting in Tanzania involving the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and the EAC.

His repeated absence from these key African gatherings raises concerns about his commitment to direct dialogue, with some seeing it as a setback for a Pan-African effort to address the escalating crisis in the Great Lakes region. 

Congo’s 30-year resource war had k*lled around 6 million people by 2010, with many more casualties since then. Many have blamed Western corporations that exploit the country’s mineral resources, estimated at $24 trillion, for exacerbating the war. In March 2024, a US court ruled against former child miners in a case against five major US tech companies: Alphabet (the parent company of Google), Dell, Apple, Tesla, and Microsoft.

Sources:

https://x.com/Presidence_RDC/status/1890097466462093689

https://www.aa.com.tr/en/africa/congo-s-president-to-skip-east-african-community-summit-on-goma-crisis/3465756

https://www.barrons.com/news/congolese-president-to-miss-au-meeting-on-eastern-drc-violence-b1db788c

https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/main-staging/business/africa/article/2001510651/drc-crisis-tshisekedi-snubs-meeting-as-eac-heads-of-state-call-for-ceasefire

https://chimpreports.com/drcs-tshisekedi-misses-sadc-eac-summit-sends-prime-minister

https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/01/1159541

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/03/05/tech/big-tech-child-labor-congo-lawsuit/index.html

https://www.caritas.org/2010/02/six-million-dead-in-congos-war

CEASEFIRE AS A WAR TACTIC BY M23 REBELS

The Rwanda-backed M23 rebel group has become skilled at using ceasefire agreements to regroup - warns Claude Gatebuke, a survivor of the Rwandan Genocide and a human-rights advocate.

He notes that this strategy was honed by Rwandan President Paul Kagame and his Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) during their collaboration with Ugandan leader Yoweri Museveni in the bush war of the 1980s.

On 4 February, M23 announced a unilateral ceasefire, claiming it was for “humanitarian reasons.” Yet, they have since taken control of Nyabibwe city and are moving south towards Bukavu, the capital of South Kivu province. The UN reports that over 700,000 people have been displaced since January 2025, with thousands killed.

Regional organisations such as the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) and the East African Community (EAC) have convened summits to try to negotiate an end to the conflict.

Continued……Gatebuke warns that, based on their history, M23 is likely to use any ceasefire as an opportunity to rearm and expand their territory.

He highlights a pattern that’s easy to recognise, and the situation on the ground supports his claims. It’s evident that Congo is suffering greatly, while those in power sit in comfortable conference rooms, supposedly working to alleviate the crisis.

As the long-suffering Congolese people are all too aware, any agreed pause is merely a brief break in the ongoing turmoil.

Sources:

https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/congo-conflict-m23-declares-ceasefire-4912974

https://www.aa.com.tr/en/africa/m23-rebel-advances-in-eastern-dr-congo-overshadows-ceasefire-in-goma/3481177#

https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/01/1159541

LET’S TALK ABOUT KEMI BADENOCH

In a speech at Michigan State University on 24 January 1963, revolutionary and civil-rights activist Malcom X (1925-65) drew a distinction between field and house N*groes. He called the latter the “twentieth-century Uncle Tom.”

Over six decades later, the distinction is still worth drawing. Every generation produces a new version of the house N*gro. They are the ones willing to betray the fight against imperialism to do their masters’ bidding for financial reward and privileges.

Continued……The new leader of the UK’s opposition Conservative Party - Kemi ‘Adegoke’ Badenoch - fits the bill perfectly. Our sister Sannario explains why.

Sources:

https://ccnmtl.columbia.edu/projects/mmt/mxp/speeches/mxt17.html

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/i-will-die-protecting-this-country-kemi-badenoch-on-where-she-plans-to-take-the-tories/

https://www.kemibadenoch.org.uk/news/kemis-column-statement-ukraine

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2024/09/28/kemi-badenoch-migrants-britain-tradition/

https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/systemic-racism-permeates-all-levels-our-society

https://africanarguments.org/2016/09/the-scale-of-the-uks-involvement-in-africas-resources-is-staggering-so-too-is-its-disregard-for-the-rights-of-those-affected/

https://republic.com.ng/october-november-2023/the-making-of-nigeria/

https://guardian.ng/news/im-yoruba-ive-nothing-in-common-with-northern-nigeria-badenoch/

CONSTRUCTION VEHICLES POUR INTO BURKINA FASO?

People on social media are cheering for Burkina Faso as internet users post videos of new road-construction vehicles pouring into the country via Ghana.

Featuring the world’s youngest president, 36-year-old Ibrahim Traoré, Burkina Faso has gained a positive reputation across the region and the continent for charting a development plan independent of former coloniser France and the West.

In recent years, the country opened two tomato-paste factories and began constructing a gold refinery and a mining-residue treatment facility. Recently, the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), to which Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger belong, revealed a plan to develop roads and railways to connect the countries’ major cities as part of its goal of free movement within the AES. The ultimate goal is to create a federated country.

Video credits: inous TV au Faso 🇧🇫 (YouTube) / @the_kandas (TikTok)

Continued……Sources:

https://www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2023/11/23/le-burkina-faso-lancement-la-construction-de-sa-premiere-raffinerie-d-or_6201923_3212.html

https://burkina24.com/2024/11/29/usine-de-transformation-de-tomates-de-bobo-dioulasso-le-capitaine-ibrahim-traore-procedera-a-linauguration-le-samedi-30-novembre-2024/

https://burkina24.com/2024/12/16/inauguration-de-lusine-de-sofato-le-president-du-faso-est-arrive-a-yako/

https://www.barrons.com/articles/burkina-faso-launches-first-mine-residue-treatment-facility-46ccaa8c

https://primature.ml/communique-du-conseil-des-ministres-du-mercredi-22-janvier-2025-cm-n2025-04-sgg

https://www.tiktok.com/@the_kandas/video/7466783603943296261

THE U.S IS THE MOST VIOLENT COUNTRY IN THE WORLD

Economist and public-policy analyst Jeffrey Sachs was interrupted during a democracy forum in Greece (in 2022) while discussing the atrocities committed by the US and the UK.

First, he highlighted Britain’s imperial violence across the globe, pointing out that while it presented itself as a democratic nation, it engaged in ruthless colonialism. Britain’s colonial footprint was left in India, Egypt and many other countries throughout Africa, Asia and the Caribbean.

Sachs also branded the US as the most violent country since the 1950s, noting its long history of using both covert and overt methods to overthrow governments that are considered unfriendly to US interests. Washington’s military operations have been employed to undermine economies worldwide.

Continued….. Furthermore, violent actions by the US and the UK have not ceased. Recently, Washington and London both aided and abetted Israel as it killed tens of thousands of Palestinians.

Video Credit: Athens Democracy Forum

Hear Us Roar: https://news.1rj.ru/str/AfricanStream

Continued……. These recommendations are widely considered to have laid the groundwork for the apartheid policies adopted in 1948. The wealth enjoyed by Afrikaners (descendants of Dutch settlers) in South Africa largely originated from this systemic change. It’s something that the country’s new Land Expropriation Law seeks to address, though some critics say it doesn’t go far enough.

Sources:

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00358533308450637

https://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/digital/collections/oral_hist/carnegie/special-features/

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/articles/Carnegie_Commission_of_Investigation_on_the_Poor_White_Question_in_South_Africa