After years of silence and desperation, news comes from the heart of Africa that sounds like a whisper of hope. In the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where the war in the east of the country continues to devour human lives and forests, the United Nations speaks for the first time of a “real possibility of ceasefire and lasting peace”.
A signal which, although fragile, could pave the way for a different future for millions of people exhausted by a conflict that has lasted for decades and has cost the dignity of hundreds of women.
To launch this glimmer is Huang XiaUN special envoy for the Great Lakes Region, who reported to the Security Council on 13 October:
There is real hope of finally reaching a ceasefire that will pave the way for a definitive solution to the conflict.
Agreements signed, truces violated
In recent months, African and international diplomacy has sought to rekindle dialogue. The Washington Agreementsigned on 27 June between the DRC and Rwanda, and the Doha Declarationsigned on July 19 between the Congolese government and the alliance Congo River/M23 thanks to Qatar’s mediation, they represented important steps. Yet, as Huang Xia himself admits, the reality on the ground remains dramatic:
Peace efforts are promising, but they have not yet fulfilled their promises. The agreed ceasefire is not respected.
The UN envoy’s words weigh like stones. Because while in Washington and Doha there was talk of peace, in eastern Congo people continued to kill, rape and destroy.
The reality on the ground: massacres and mass rapes
The reports from Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International tell of a nightmare that continues amidst general indifference. Despite peace negotiations, the M23 rebels, supported militarily by Rwanda (a charge Kigali denies), have carried out mass killings, collective rapes and atrocities against civilians.
According to reports published in the summer of 2025, at least 140 people were killed in July alone, but the real number could exceed 300 victims in the territory of Rutshuruin North Kivu.
Survivors recount horrors that are difficult to even imagine. A woman saw her husband massacred with a machete before being forced – together with 70 other people – to march to the bank of a river.
They ordered us to sit on the edge. Then they started shooting. I’m only alive because I fell into the water, she says, her voice broken by the memory.
Another witness saw his wife and four children die under the rebels’ blows.
At least 14 villages near Virunga National Park, one of the richest and most precious biodiversity areas on the planet, have been devastated.
The women’s body as a battlefield
The Amnesty International report denounces the systematic use of sexual violence as a weapon of war — a ferocity exercised by both the M23 rebels and the Wazalendoa coalition of militias supported by the Congolese army.
A survivor says she was captured by two M23 militiamen on January 27, the day the city of Goma fell under rebel control:
One wanted to kill me. The other said, ‘No, she’s beautiful, we’ll sleep with her.’ Since then I can’t sleep anymore. Every time I see an armed soldier, I go back to that moment.
According to Doctors Without Borders, between January and April 2025 almost 7,400 women were treated for sexual violence in the Goma area alone. In Sake, not far away, there were over 2,400 victims in the same period.
Amnesty also documents summary executions, torture, kidnappings of doctors and patients, and the illegal detention of journalists and activists. Every day, the civilian population pays the highest price of a conflict that spares no one.
In Goma, in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, hundreds of women survivors of sexual violence seek…
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Since January 2025, over 1.6 million people have been forced to abandon their homes, according to data from OCHA, the UN Office for Humanitarian Affairs. More than 68% of displacements are directly linked to fighting.
Villages erased from maps, families taking refuge in camps without water or food, traumatized children who no longer remember what it means to go to school. And even the Congo rainforest, the second green lung of the planet, is dying with them: war fuels deforestation, survival hunting and the plundering of natural resources.
In his speech, Huang Xia praised the diplomatic work of the United States and Qatar, but reiterated that the time for words is over:
The humanitarian crisis is catastrophic. We need an immediate and unconditional ceasefire.
France also asked to apply Security Council Resolution 2773, which reaffirms the sovereignty of the DRC and requires the cessation of hostilities by M23.
The resolution must be fully respected – declared the French ambassador Jérôme Bonnafont – starting with the withdrawal of Rwandan forces from Congolese territory and the end of their support for the rebels.
But while diplomats talk about peace, the war continues in the Kivu provinces.
The deep roots of the conflict
Peace, however, cannot arise only from signatures on agreements. As the UN envoy recalled, we need to address the root causes of the war: extreme poverty, exploitation of natural resources, corruption, inequalities and the absence of strong institutions.
An important reference remains the Addis Ababa Framework of 2013, signed to put an end to the chronic instability of Congo. A document which, twelve years later, remains a moral and political compass, but which needs to be accompanied by concrete facts, not just promises.
The road to peace is fragile, but every small step counts. In the Congo, the wound of man and that of nature are confused: where war destroys, even the earth stops breathing. Stopping shooting and restoring dignity doesn’t just mean saving lives, but giving life a chance to grow again — in people, in communities, in forests.
Sources: UN / Human Rights Watch / Amnesty International / MSF
