As we continue through the year of 2023, we will all have to contend with the numerous issues plaguing the world today. War rages in Eastern Europe as Russia continues its unprovoked campaign of aggression against Ukraine. Tensions continue to mount between the United States and China. But one forgotten theater of contemporary geopolitical crisis has been the region of central Africa, and arguably it is one of the most important crises we currently face.
Ever since the end of western colonialism, Central Africa has been plagued by nonstop violence, poverty, war, and ethnic strife. The conflicts are as complex as they are varied, fueled by tribal differences, income inequality, squabbling over natural resources, and bickering over political power. And as much as the western world has tended to turn a blind eye to the conflicts in Africa, they hold in the balance millions of innocent lives.
In the region of North Kivu in the northeastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, tensions are reaching a breaking point. Since the Rwandan genocide in 1994 caused a massive refugee crisis, which in turn led to the Congo Wars, the entire region has been plagued by sectarian violence and is primed for conflict. In North Kivu, an armed rebel group known as the Allied Democratic Forces has been waging a violent insurgency since the late 1990s, which has led to thousands of deaths and has jeopardized the stability of the entire region.
The Allied Democratic Forces developed in the aftermath of the Ugandan Civil War, which saw multiple armed groups rebel against the Ugandan government led by President Yoweri Museveni. Though the war ended in a government victory, with most of the rebels being pushed out, these armed militants continue to wage war against innocent civilians across the region.
The Allied Democratic Forces were among the Ugandan rebel groups that were forced out of Uganda in the aftermath of the civil war. They reestablished themselves in North Kivu and have waged a guerrilla war ever since, attacking aid convoys, kidnapping children to serve as child soldiers, massacring civilians, and establishing a sophisticated network of camps where militants are armed, trained, supplied, and coordinate attacks.
In 2016, the leader of the ADF, Jamil Mukulu, was arrested and is currently awaiting trial in the ICC for war crimes and crimes against humanity. The ADF is now currently led by one of Mukulu's successors, Musa Baluku - formerly the "chief Islamic judge" of the group - and under Baluku's reign, the ADF has begun to expand their outreach and the scope of their attacks. In late 2017, hundreds of ADF militants attacked a United Nations peacekeeping outpost in Semuliki, killing 15 peacekeepers and wounding dozens more in what was the deadliest attack against the UN since 1993.
Baluku has also begun to align the ADF with other militant Islamist groups, including the Somali-based Al-Shabaab and the Islamic State. In 2018, Baluku aligned the ADF with the Islamic State and established the group's Central Africa Province (ISCAP).
Though the Islamic State has its origins in Iraq and Syria, it has since expanded into a global terrorist network and has recently set its sights on Central Africa. While the Islamic State has lost most of its territory in the Middle East, it has become an increasingly dangerous threat in Central Africa as groups like the ADF have coalesced under their umbrella. Attacks by the ADF have rapidly increased in scope and in violence since 2018, and the insurgency once contained to the North Kivu region has begun to spread back into Uganda.
On June 16th, 2023, the ADF committed the deadliest attack in Uganda in nearly thirty years. A group of approximately 20 ADF militants attacked the Mpondwe Lhubiriha Secondary School in Mpondwe, Uganda, shooting dead the school's security guard, setting fire to dormitory buildings, and hacking dozens of students and staff to death with machetes. The attack killed 41 people and left the nation - which had not suffered such an act in decades - in shock.
This attack was only the latest in a series of violent acts of terrorism attributed to the ADF and the Islamic State's Central Africa Province. Despite repeated efforts by Congolese, UN, and African Union forces, the ADF insurgency is alive and well and is continuing to grow.
I first discussed the threat of the ADF insurgency on this website in late 2018, when Central Africa was undergoing an Ebola outbreak and efforts by aid workers to contain it were hampered by militant attacks. At the time, the crisis was mostly contained to the North Kivu region. But now, with Uganda once again in the crosshairs of the ADF, it is clear the group's threat is only growing in size and scale.
Central Africa has long been a hotbed of conflict, with dozens of different ethnic groups constantly warring over natural resources and territory. Because of the region's remoteness, the Congolese government in Kinshasa has been unable to effectively rule the region, and many Congolese army units have themselves split along ethnic lines. The United Nations, for its part, has deployed a peacekeeping force to combat the ADF - which has seen limited success in some areas - but it is clear that the ADF continues to pose a major regional security threat - a threat which is now beginning to spread beyond North Kivu and back into Uganda.
The entire world saw the catastrophe that followed the rise of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, when the terrorist network began seizing vast swaths of territory, threatening to take over both countries, and beginning to direct terror attacks against Europe and other nations. It took a sustained, costly campaign by a coalition of nations to defeat the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria - a campaign that led to the deaths of tens of thousands and a devastating refugee crisis that overwhelmed Europe. If such a situation were to arise in Central Africa - which is already a tinderbox waiting to ignite - the consequences could be even worse.
The Congo Wars, which tore Central Africa apart in the late 1990s and early 2000s, were the deadliest conflicts in the world since World War II. Over six million people died as a result of the war, and the ramifications of it continue to plague the region to this day. The potential for the Islamic State to take hold in Central Africa through the ADF is a nightmarish scenario that should be a major priority for the entire world to prevent. The entire region has suffered through generations of war, genocide, famine, and sectarian violence - often while the western world has turned a blind eye to their plight. And if the world continues to turn a blind eye to the growing crisis in Central Africa, it will suffer the same consequences of its ignorance as it did in Iraq and Syria.
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