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Still no justice for massacres in western DRC

Published: 17 Dec 2019

  Exactly one year ago, hundreds of people were slaughtered in Yumbi, in western Democratic Republic of Congo. On 15 and 16 December 2018, assailants targeted members of the Nunu ethnic group in a deliberate and organised manner. The attack lasted less than 48 hours but left the area in total disarray. As attention is…

Justice n’est toujours pas rendue pour les massacres de l’ouest de la RDC

Published: 17 Dec 2019

  Il y a exactement un an, des centaines de personnes étaient massacrées à Yumbi, dans la partie occidentale de la République démocratique du Congo. Les 16 et 17 décembre 2018, des assaillants ont ciblé des membres de l’ethnie Nunu de façon délibérée et organisée. L’attaque a duré moins que 48 heures mais a laissé…

Why Tanzania shouldn’t force Burundian refugees to return

Published: 18 Oct 2019

  Forcing Burundian refugees in Tanzania to leave the country is not only problematic legally, it could also sow the seeds for renewed conflict and displacement in Burundi. At the end of August, the Burundian and Tanzanian governments jointly announced that the 183,000 Burundian refugees would be repatriated. While such a large-scale operation has yet…

Expliquer la violence à Yumbi

Published: 24 Apr 2019

En décembre 2018, deux semaines seulement avant les élections nationales, des centaines de personnes ont été tuées lors d’un massacre en République démocratique du Congo (RDC). Les scènes sinistres ne se sont pas déroulées à l’Est, où la violence armée a causé la mort de nombreuses victimes depuis des décennies. Cette fois-ci, l’horreur s’est perpétrée…

Explaining the violence in Yumbi

Published: 24 Apr 2019

In December 2018, only two weeks before national elections, hundreds of people were killed in a massacre in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). This time, the grim scenes did not play out in the east, where armed violence has marked people’s lives for decades, but in western Congo, 300 km northeast of the capital…

The Global Refugee Compact: Considering Urban Refugees

Published: 13 Feb 2019

One of the slums in Kibuye, Kampala where urban refugees live. Picture extracted from video by scidevnet Contrary to public perception, the majority of refugees live in cities and towns rather than camps. In these urban spaces, some send their children to school, generate livelihoods and successfully negotiate their own way through exile. Others barely…

RDC : l’Église se dresse face à Kabila

Published: 5 Jan 2019

En RDC, l’Église catholique affirme “que les données en sa possession […] consacrent le choix d’un candidat comme président de la République”. Quand les voix du seigneur soufflent le nom du futur président. C’est une véritable bombe qu’ont larguée les dignitaires de l’Église catholique du Congo ce jeudi. Fort de ses 40 000 observateurs envoyés…

South Sudan peace deal: ‘Whose power are they sharing anyway?’

Published: 15 Nov 2018

Photo by Stefanie Glinski/IRIN  More than four million South Sudanese, a third of the country’s population, have been forced to flee their homes during the last five years. Without an effort to include their views – not just those of the country’s political elite – lasting peace will be difficult to achieve. The signing in…

Tough Times Ahead for UN Mission in Congo

Published: 26 Apr 2018

  On March 30, the UN Security Council renewed the mandate of the UN Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), known under its acronym MONUSCO. In contrast to last year, it was renewed without the threat of budget cuts or any major changes to its complex mandate. The mission maintains its two priorities: addressing the tense…

What’s happening in Ituri?

Published: 6 Mar 2018

Over sixty people killed, thousands of houses burned down and more than 100,000 displaced people, including 42,000 refugees in neighbouring Uganda. Those are the consequences so far of the violence in the north-eastern Ituri province of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) since December 2017. The violence marks a counterpoint to the general trend in…

The Congo’s political crisis is stirring deadly violence in Kasai and beyond

Published: 16 Jan 2018

  Over the last couple of years, scores of activists have died protesting against President Joseph Kabila’s refusal to step down. In the latest bout of nationwide demonstrations on 31 December 2017, at least seven more were killed as they took the streets. Many more were arrested. However, it is not just the Democratic Republic…

“Their Priority Is Not the People”: Civilian Views on Peace Operations in Africa

Published: 25 Sep 2017

  Their priority is not the people of Somalia,” a Somali woman who had recently fled to the Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya said about peacekeepers in her home country. “It is the government and themselves.” Unfortunately, this view is not unique. Civilians in countries with peace operations often experience a wide gap between them…

Read the press coverage of IRRI’s report “I was left with nothing”

Published: 28 Jul 2017

Read the press coverage of the report: Lucy Hovil, “Israel: Refugees not Welcome,” 21 September 2015 The Guardian article Al Jazeera, “Rejected by Israel, Eritreans find shelter in Germany,” 3 March 2017 Rebélion article Radio France International Interview Al Jazeera, “A refugee’s gruelling odyssey – from Eritrea to Germany,” 5 October 2015 Al Jazeera, “Do…

Two Steps Forward, One Step Back: The Deterrent Effect of International Criminal Tribunals

Published: 4 Nov 2016

The idea of the deterrence project originated in one of the Academy’s Advisory Council meetings. Justice SONG Sang-Hyun, former President of the International Criminal Court (‘ICC’), proposed that the Academy could conduct a study into whether the ICC has had a deterrent effect. A preliminary literature survey disclosed that no major study had been conducted…

“My Camera as My Gun” – Sudan human rights monitoring

Published: 29 Jul 2016

  State repression and violent conflict lead to gross human rights violations on a daily basis worldwide. Many of these conflicts and violations barely see the light of day as they often happen in areas less of a priority to international key players. Courageous local human rights monitors struggle to collect evidence and put pressure…

The Guardian article

Published: 11 Sep 2015

The deportation under a voluntary scheme of Eritreans and Sudanese from Israel to “third countries” in Africa is exposing them to danger, with some being left without proper documentation and at risk of discrimination in unfamiliar environments, a report released this week says.

With camps limiting many refugees, the UNHCR’s policy change is welcome

Published: 2 Oct 2014

It is rare to witness a paradigm shift in refugee protection. But such a shift has just happened with the release of the new policy from the UN high commissioner for refugees (UNHCR) on alternatives to refugee camps. For refugees and their advocates, who have been shouting for years about the perils associated with camps,…

Why do we continually misunderstand conflict in Africa?

Published: 10 Feb 2014

Violence in Africa seems particularly prone to the scourge of one-dimensional descriptions. Often described as ethnic or tribal, and sometimes as sectarian, the media prescribes an adjective that quickly becomes accepted as gospel and this explanation is then hard to shift. Thus we are told that the recent outbreak of violence in South Sudan is ethnic(Nuer…