What happened
The M23 insurgency in eastern DRC has continued to hold and, in places, expand territorial control across North Kivu and parts of South Kivu through 2026, despite periodic ceasefire and mediation processes under the Luanda and Nairobi-Angola frameworks and successive rounds of Doha-brokered talks. UN Group of Experts reporting has repeatedly assessed that Rwandan military personnel and materiel support M23 operations, an assessment Kigali disputes, while ACLED and Crisis Group tracking shows the group's operations increasingly intertwined with control of mineral-trading routes and taxation of civilian populations in areas it holds.
Regional diplomatic engagement — including the African Union, the East African Community's now-suspended regional force, and the Southern African Development Community's deployment in support of the DRC government — has produced overlapping and at times competing mediation tracks without a durable ceasefire. Displacement figures tracked by UN OCHA and IOM have continued to climb, with recurring waves of internal displacement around Goma and other North Kivu towns.
Why it matters
What began as a localised insurgency has become a regional security and diplomatic problem that now touches Rwanda–DRC bilateral relations, Uganda's own military presence in eastern DRC against the ADF, Burundi's border security posture and the credibility of regional and continental mediation institutions. The risk of a wider regional conflagration — while still assessed as a lower-probability outcome by most regional analysts — has risen to a level where governments, businesses and humanitarian actors operating anywhere in the Great Lakes need to treat eastern DRC as a regional, not merely local, risk driver.
The conflict's entanglement with mineral supply chains — particularly coltan, tin and gold moving through M23-controlled or -adjacent territory — also means that companies and investors with exposure to Great Lakes minerals sourcing face growing scrutiny under conflict-minerals due diligence frameworks, independent of their direct exposure to the conflict itself.
How the threat is evolving
Three evolutions define the current phase. First, M23's governance ambitions have grown alongside its territorial control: the group has moved from purely military objectives toward establishing parallel administrative and taxation structures in areas it holds, a pattern UN Group of Experts reporting has documented in detail. Second, the proliferation of allied and rival armed groups — including various Mai-Mai factions and the Wazalendo coalition backed by Kinshasa — has fragmented the conflict landscape, increasing the risk of intercommunal violence layered on top of the M23 confrontation. Third, mediation fatigue is setting in: overlapping Luanda, Nairobi and Doha processes have produced repeated ceasefire announcements that have not translated into sustained de-escalation on the ground, weakening the credibility of future diplomatic initiatives.
Eastern DRC no longer has a single conflict to resolve; it has a layered set of military, criminal and governance disputes that any single peace process is unlikely to settle on its own.
- Continued reported presence of Rwandan military personnel or materiel in M23-held areas, per UN Group of Experts findings.
- Expansion or contraction of M23-controlled territory around Goma, Sake and key mineral-trading towns.
- Status and compliance with successive Luanda, Nairobi and Doha ceasefire commitments.
- Displacement flow trends tracked by UN OCHA and IOM around North Kivu and South Kivu.
- Diplomatic and rhetorical escalation between Kinshasa and Kigali, including troop mobilisation signalling.
Security implications
For organisations with a Great Lakes footprint, the practical implication is that risk planning needs to extend beyond eastern DRC itself to Rwanda's western border areas, Uganda's border districts and Burundi, where spillover risk — refugee flows, cross-border skirmishes, and the potential for retaliatory or proxy dynamics — is realistic rather than speculative. Kigali and Kampala should not be treated as insulated from the conflict simply because active fighting has not reached their territory.
Business implications
Mining, logistics and trading companies with any exposure to Great Lakes mineral supply chains should intensify conflict-minerals due diligence, given the reputational and, increasingly, regulatory risk of sourcing from or transiting through M23-controlled or -adjacent territory. Regional businesses more broadly should monitor Rwanda–DRC diplomatic relations as a leading indicator of border trade disruption, given the two countries' economic interdependence in the region.
NGO/humanitarian implications
Humanitarian operations in North and South Kivu continue to face access denial, taxation and security risk consistent with the broader continental access crisis, but with the added complexity of shifting frontlines that can render access agreements obsolete within days. Agencies should treat displacement forecasting as a live planning input rather than a retrospective statistic, given the recurring pattern of sudden, large-scale displacement around contested towns.
- Extend Great Lakes risk monitoring to Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi border areas, not only DRC territory.
- Strengthen conflict-minerals due diligence for any Great Lakes-linked supply chain exposure.
- Maintain flexible, short-cycle access agreements given the volatility of frontlines in North and South Kivu.
- Track UN Group of Experts and Crisis Group reporting as an early indicator of shifts in external state support to armed actors.
What to monitor next
Watch the outcomes of the Doha and Luanda-track negotiations, the next UN Group of Experts report for updated assessments of external support to M23, ACLED's territorial control tracking around Goma and Sake, and diplomatic signalling between Kinshasa and Kigali for indicators of either de-escalation or a harder confrontation.