US-backed DRC peace deal sidesteps African solutions
By Dennis Mogare, July 9, 2025On June 27, 2025, in a high-profile diplomatic spectacle, the United States brokered what is now known as the Washington Accord, a peace deal between the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Rwanda aimed at ending the incessant conflict in eastern Congo.
Lauded in Washington as a strategic triumph, the accord commits both states to cease hostilities, respect territorial integrity, and create joint mechanisms for oversight and security coordination.
Yet behind the headlines lies a fragile and transactional deal, shaped more by US geopolitical ambition than by a durable commitment to peace or regional sovereignty.
The Washington Accord is less a peace treaty and more of a geopolitical bargain. It links security cooperation to economic incentives, most notably US access to the DRC’s vast mineral wealth.
President Trump himself made this explicit, declaring the deal an opportunity to “secure a lot of the mineral rights from the Congo”.
The logic is brutally transactional: peace in exchange for minerals. But in sidelining African-led peace initiatives and excluding the main rebel belligerent (the M23 movement), the accord risks becoming another foreign-engineered fix that ultimately deepens the conflict it aims to resolve.
The agreement’s most glaring flaw is the absence of M23 and its political wing, the Alliance Fleuve Congo (AFC), both of which continue to control swathes of eastern DRC, including the strategic city of Goma.
These rebels, widely understood to receive Rwandan support, are not signatories and thus not bound by the deal. Instead, the accord defers their inclusion to a stalled, separate negotiation track in Doha.
Without M23 buy-in, the deal addresses a state-to-state conflict while ignoring the central battlefield realities. It is, in essence, a ceasefire between generals while the foot soldiers remain locked in combat.
Equally concerning is the accord’s ambiguity and lack of enforcement. It demands that Rwanda withdraw its forces within 90 days and that the DRC “neutralise” the FDLR militia.
Yet these commitments are vague, unenforceable, and open to manipulation. Rwanda can delay withdrawal by citing the persistent threat of the FDLR, while Kinshasa, lacking a viable military strategy, continues to empower volatile local militias.
This mutual distrust undermines any serious implementation, leaving the door wide open for renewed escalation.
The broader context is damning. The deal comes in the wake of the collapse of two African-led initiatives: the East African Community Regional Force, which was expelled for perceived inaction, and the Southern African Development Community’s SAMIDRC mission, which suffered a humiliating military defeat.
Both failures reflect a deeper malaise within the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA) – underfunded, fragmented, and politically compromised.
In their place, the US has filled the vacuum, not to support African solutions, but to outmanoeuvre China in the global race for critical minerals.
This shift exposes the hollowness of the “African solutions to African problems” doctrine. Once a proud rallying cry for the continental agency, it now appears more aspirational than operational.
The African Union, unable to forge consensus or coordinate effective regional responses, has been relegated to observer status in the Joint Oversight Committee.
This symbolic inclusion masks a painful truth: African institutions have lost control of one of the continent’s most critical security crises.
The writer is a foreign policy Analyst and a Doctoral Candidate in international studies