Rwandan President Paul Kagame said in a Jan. 9 public address that Rwanda “cannot keep hosting refugees” from the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Rwanda can no longer offer refuge to people fleeing conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Rwandan president said.

We have had refugees here for over 20 years, from DRC. I am refusing that Rwanda should carry this burden and be insulted and abused every day about it,” Paul Kagame told the senate.

The country already hosts around 72,000 refugees from DR Congo.

This is not Rwanda’s problem. And we are going to ensure that everybody realizes that it is not Rwanda’s problem,” Kagame said.

His comments came amid tensions between Kigali and Kinshasa over Congolese M23 rebels fighting government troops in the east.

DR Congo accuses Rwanda of backing the rebels, a charge Rwanda has consistently denied.

But UN experts said in report published in December 2022, that they had substantial evidence of “direct intervention by the Rwandan Defence Forces (RDF) on the territory of the DRC.”

Kigali has in turn accused Kinshasa of allying with Rwandan rebels of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), whose elements are blamed for the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi ethnic group.

Last year, Rwanda inked a controversial deal with the UK government to host illegal arrivals using the English Channel to reach there.

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Piers Potter

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