The DRC government and M23 rebels agreed on Saturday to ease aid deliveries and release prisoners after five days of talks in Switzerland, a rare step forward in a conflict that has kept eastern Congo on edge despite earlier peace efforts. The two sides also signed a memorandum of understanding for a ceasefire monitoring mechanism.
The monitoring body will begin surveillance, monitoring, verification and reporting on compliance with a permanent ceasefire between the parties. Under the agreement, both sides pledged not to target civilians, to facilitate medical care for the wounded and sick, and to avoid any action that would undermine humanitarian assistance in areas hit by the fighting. Prisoners are to be released within 10 days.
The talks were held in Montreux, on the Swiss Riviera, with representatives from Qatar, the United States, Switzerland, the African Union Commission and Togo taking part. Togo served as the African Union mediator. The latest statement also said the parties made progress on a protocol for humanitarian access and judicial protections, a signal that the sides are at least willing to put written commitments around issues that have repeatedly collapsed in the past.
That matters because the war in eastern DRC has persisted despite multiple peace deals. Since 2021, M23, backed by Rwanda, has seized territory in eastern DRC, and fighting has continued even after the government and rebels signed a United States-brokered peace agreement in December. Clashes have recently reached the highland areas of South Kivu, where civilians are trapped between shifting front lines and blocked routes.
Human Rights Watch said last week that the parties were blocking aid deliveries and stopping civilians from fleeing the South Kivu highlands. Clementine de Montjoye said civilians there are facing a dire humanitarian crisis and live in fear of abuses by all parties. The new commitments answer those accusations on paper, but they do not yet prove that aid will move freely or that combatants will stop using civilians as leverage. The first test is whether prisoners are actually freed within 10 days and whether the ceasefire mechanism can document violations before the next round of fighting does the talking.
