Shame on world leaders for neglect of displaced civilians in DRC, says aid chief

World leaders should be ashamed of their neglect of people whose lives were “hanging by a thread” at a time of surging violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the international charity leader Jan Egeland has said.

In a stinging attack on aid cuts and the “nationalistic winds” blowing across Europe and the US, the Norwegian Refugee Council’s head told the Guardian how people were living out in the open, in overcrowded, unsanitary displacement encampments around the city of Goma, where 1.2 million people have had to flee from their homes as the M23 rebels advanced through the DRC’s North and South Kivu provinces.

“The level of global neglect experienced by civilians in eastern DRC should shame world leaders,” he said, adding that European countries and others had ignored the suffering for years.

An open area full of people with latrines and classrooms in the background — The camp at Nyiragongo, where thousands of displaced people have been living in grim conditions. The camp has now been rehabilitated by the NRC. Photograph: Ed Prior/NRC

“We hope that a Europe and the US, which is very self-centred, where nationalistic winds are blowing, where aid is being cut and international solidarity is not what it was, will open their eyes to the immense suffering that is in the Democratic Republic of the Congo,” said Egeland, who has just returned from a visit to the area.

“[I saw] overflowing latrines, 25 people sleeping in a classroom where they have to drag their few belongings out every morning because the classroom is used for school, then every afternoon return to the classroom to sleep overnight. It’s really subhuman,” he said.

Eastern DRC has long suffered from violence, and the camps in Goma, capital of North Kivu province, host people who have been displaced for years.

A woman holds a baby as a crowd looks on — Beatrice, whose husband and a child were killed in the war. She cares for two babies alone with no help this year, collecting plastic bottles and begging to survive. Photograph: Ed Prior/NRC

However, conditions have deteriorated since the M23 rebellion launched in 2022. The Rwandan-backed group has managed to seize large parts of eastern DRC, including Goma and other key towns, since January.

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Egeland said the humanitarian situation had been complicated by M23 forcing displaced people to leave the camps, often giving them only 72 hours to move on. Many people had returned to their homes, where there was relative safety now that the M23 had taken control.

He warned, however, that a political settlement was needed now as well as aid, especially in the form of cash, to ensure displaced people could buy food and rebuild their homes and livelihoods in places devastated by years of conflict.

Egeland said charities were struggling because they often had still not been paid for work done last year because of President Donald Trump’s freezing of US aid spending in January, and even projects that had been approved by Washington had not yet received money.

He said that while support from Norway, which had fast-tracked pre-existing pledges, had allowed the NRC to continue working, other humanitarian organisations were struggling.

“At a time of enormous needs – because of the recent increase in fighting – and of opportunity [to help] the many who can return, the money is not coming in,” he said. “It means people are not helped, they linger in camps with worsening conditions, that children cannot go to school.”

Source: The Guardian