Eastern Congo

A weekly round-up of must-read stories, posted every Friday (or on occasion, on Saturday).  Read More »

The Enough Project’s latest report, “Ensuring Success: Four Steps Beyond U.S. troops to End the War with the LRA,” outlines a comprehensive strategy for helping U.S. and African Union, or A.U., forces end the LRA and bring reconciliation to affected communities. Based on interviews in Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Washington, D.C., in December and January, this military and civilian focused approach is comprised of four specific strategies known collectively as TTID: increased special forces troop contributions, robust transportation options, enhanced intelligence capabilities, and renewed commitment to promoting the defections of LRA commanders and rank-and-file fighters.  Read More »

In a newly released industry white paper the Intel Corporation praised the Securities and Exchange Commission’s, or SEC, process for instituting rules concerning conflict minerals mined in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In section 1502, the conflict minerals provision of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010, Congress empowered the SEC to draft regulations requiring, among other things, companies to disclose whether they use conflict minerals from the Congo in their products.  Read More »

2011 was a year of unprecedented action on behalf of freedom and human rights. When citizens flooded streets throughout the Middle East and North Africa, the U.S. and other countries dropped their long-standing presidential allies and demanded new leadership. When massive human rights abuses loomed in Libya and Ivory Coast, the international community acted decisively. That backdrop makes it all the more puzzling why the two countries where human rights abuses are worst in the world—Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo—have received such comparatively tepid international responses.  Read More »

These top experts and advisors opened up the @WHLive twitter account for a #WHChat driven by questions and comments from the public. While tweets flowed in with a range of pressing issues, advocacy groups like the Enough Project, Resolve, and Invisible Children as well as concerned activists nation-wide utilized this opportunity to draw attention to the Lord’s Resistance Army, or LRA.  Read More »

Just over a week ago, a group of students and I who are part of the Coalition for a Conflict-Free Duke sent a video message to Tim Cook, Apple CEO and fellow Dukie, imploring him to create a conflict-free product by the end of 2013. Student leader Stefani Jones wrote this blog post that originally appeared on Huffington Post.  Read More »

When Rwanda returned about 90 metric tons of smuggled minerals to Congolese authorities early November last year, many took that as a sign of a growing commitment by the regional powers to fight illicit mineral trade. It went largely unnoticed until now that the returned minerals vanished on the Congolese side  Read More »

The trial of former Lord’s Resistance Army commander Thomas Kwoyelo took a new turn but did not conclusively end yesterday when the High Court of Uganda ordered that Kwoyelo be granted amnesty.  Read More »

On Wednesday night, Gaithersburg, Maryland became the epicenter of the grassroots movement to end the conflict in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. The small, unassuming town reminds you of something out of a scene from "Gone with the Wind." Complete with an old train station and a main street lined with small storefronts, Gaithersburg isn’t the place where you might necessarily expect neighbors, students, community leaders, and Congolese immigrants to gather to discuss how their community can affect change in the Congo.  Read More »