Our submission and position about refugees in DRCongo during one day of reflexion by the Civil Society in Kinshasa

Our position on the Democratic Republic of Congo Washington Agreement on the issues about refugees.

The Democratic Republic of Congo signed a Peace agreement with Rwanda in Washington in order to end the ongoing war supported by Rwanda. The CEPAS which is one among the Civil Society Organizations based in Kinshasa organized therefore a one day reflexion of this peace agreement in order to help people to understand it better and formulate better recommendations, the meeting brought together experts from legal, economic, political and security and focused on critical analysis of the peace agreement.

COJESKI-DRC set up a priority to promote refugee protection in DRC and over the years, refugee issues lacked people who can advocate for it and share to the public accurate information. Now we are here and fully engaged.

The meeting was held at CEPAS offices on Thursday April 2^nd , 2026 starting at 9h30 am and ended at 1h30 pm.

As also issues about refugees were brought into discussions, we managed to get opportunities in order to make a position clear and made the following recommendations to the Members of Parliament who were invited.

We recalled the necessity and urgency to introduce to the Parliament two bills of Law one on refugees and another one on Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) which should help us to ensure the protection of refugees,

We recalled the necessity to remind the Government about her obligations to ensure the protection of refugees, and implemented already signed conventions, rather than making unnecessary agreements on refugees,

We recalled that Rwandan refugees in DRC should not be either discriminated, singularized or submitted to political demands through agreements, DRC should come up with a comprehensive approach for all refugees on its territory,

We recalled the need to end the debate on the myth about FDLR (Rwanda’s fighters in DRC) who no one knows where they are up to now, and requested that this issue be put aside,

Some interventions argued towards the necessity of the protection of Rwandan refugees in DRC, and the need to ensure they are no longer used in order to claim the presence of FDLR,

We also got this opportunities to inform the audience about the situation of refugees in Kinshasa and the dire situation in which they are living. Many indicated they have never seen a refugee and they do not known how refugees look like.

We agreed to have more time and organize sessions in which refugee issues can be fully addressed and where refugees can be present so that the audience may see them physically.

Refugees and FDLR

We strongly believed that FDLR is myth and do not exist in DRC anymore, we even tasked the meeting to tell us where do FDLR are, in the same way, recently we addressed a letter to the European Union to share with us more information about FDLR in DRC and we invite anyone who may have information about FDLR in DRC to contact us.

However we recognized that there are various versions about FDLR, for Rwanda FDRL are both all Rwandan refugees in Eastern DRC who do not want to go back to Rwanda, the Congolese local defense groups called Wazalendo and some Congolese Army officers. For DRC Government FDLR are in areas controlled by Rwanda currently, for Rwandan FDLR is state on mind of those who reject the dictatorship of President Paul Kagame and call for a political change in Rwanda.

LOBBY FOR A REFUGEE GROUP AT BCNUDH

The same day of Thursday April 2^nd, 2026 we also attended the general meeting of human rights defenders in Kinshasa held at the Offices of the United Nations on the situation of human rights in the City.

We presented on issues about refugees and requested the United Nations Human Rights Office to have in place a specific working group on refugees and other forced migrants. The participants were surprised to hear that we have refugees from Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi, Angola, Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, Sudan, Somalia, and South Sudan among others.

All these efforts were part of our strategy to promote the effective protection of refugees and create awareness about the situation of refugees in the country. One among our strategy is to help Congolese to know more about refugees and what they can do in order to ensure their protection.