People protest against the conflict in eastern DRC during an African Union assembly in Addis Ababa on 17 February 2024.
Amanuel Sileshi /AFP via Getty Images
The new intervention force must be sizeable, and have proper air cover as well as transport and air elements. None are guaranteed.
Kenyan soldiers from the East African Community Regional Force leave the Democratic Republic of Congo on 3 December 2023.
Alexis Huguet/AFP via Getty Images
The international effort to address three decades of violence in eastern DRC has drawn in the UN, east African troops and now a southern African force.
A soldier guards a camp in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo in January 2023.
Guerchom Ndebo/AFP via Getty Images
The UN mission is being held responsible for something the Congolese state should be doing.
Displaced people arrive in Pemba, Mozambique, after fleeing Palma following a brutal attack by Islamist insurgents in March.
John Wessels/AFF via Getty Images
Intervention in Cabo Delgado is a potentially dangerous move with far-reaching consequences for SADC if its efforts fail, or it becomes a protracted intervention.
Peacekeeper with the UN Organisation Stabilisation Mission in the DRC
MONUSCO/Sylvain Liechti
The independent strategic review, now before the Security Council, recognises many of the challenges ahead. But it appears overly sanguine about what can be achieved within a three-year period.
DRC President Joseph Kabila in Kinshasa.
Kenny Katombe/Reuters
The Democratic Republic of Congo desperately needs a peaceful election but with the UN threatening to scale back its DRC mission, the likelihood of a successful poll is being threatened
Jan Smuts Professor of International Relations and Director of the African Centre for the Study of the United States (ACSUS), University of the Witwatersrand