Timeline

1960: After almost a century of colonization, the Congo declares independence from Belgium on June 30. The charismatic Patrice Lumumba is elected prime minister and Joseph Kasavubu becomes president of the Congo. Shortly after Lumumba takes office, he is dismissed and arrested soon after. Moise Tshombe declares Katanga an independent province and is elected president.

1961: Belgian- and U.S.-backed troops arrange Lumumba’s assassination. Later that year, Mobutu Sese Seko, an army general favored by the United States, seizes power in a coup, propping up a Kasavubu-led government, and begins disarming Katangese soldiers. That coup paves the way for what would be 32 years of corrupt anti-Communist rule.

1962: In the wake of Rwandan independence from Belgium, the majority Hutus seize power from the minority Tutsis, effectively switching roles of oppressor and oppressed. Tens of thousands of Tutsis flee to neighboring countries, with some forming a guerrilla army, the Rwandan Patriotic Front. Lying to Rwanda’s west, the Congo becomes entangled in the conflict between the two groups as refugees and rebels alike flee to the Congo’s eastern cities.

1963: Tshombe agrees to end Katanga’s secession.

1964: Kasavubu appoints Tshombe prime minister.

1965: Kasavubu and Tshombe are ousted in a coup led by Mobutu.

1966: Mobutu changes the names of major cities to local language names. The capital Léopoldville becomes Kinshasa.

1971: Mobutu renames the nation “the Republic of Zaire” and decrees that all citizens take African, rather than Christian, names. He becomes “Mobutu Sese Seko.”

1973: Mobutu nationalizes foreign-owned firms and forces European investors out of the country.

1977: Mobutu invites foreign investors back, without much success. French, Belgian and Moroccan troops help repulse an attack on Katanga by Angolan-based rebels.

1989: Zaire defaults on loans from Belgium, resulting in a deterioration of the economy.

1990: Shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Mobutu, responding to U.S. pressure, agrees to end the ban on multiparty politics and appoints a transitional government, but he retains substantial power.

1991: Following riots in Kinshasa by unpaid soldiers, Mobutu agrees to a coalition government with opposition leaders. He retains control of security apparatus and important ministries.

1993: Rival pro- and anti-Mobutu governments are created.

1994: The Rwandan civil war between the Hutus and the Tutsis spills over into the Congo, creating vast refugee camps in the east, sheltering 2 million Rwandan Hutus, among them the interahamwe, the perpetrators of the genocide.

1996: Using the refugee camps as a base, Rwandan Hutus launch raids on Zairean Banyamulenge Tutsis. Siding with the perpetrators of the Rwandan genocide, the Mobutu government threatens to expel all Tutsis from Zaire. In the autumn, Laurent Kabila and the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire (ADFL) take on Mobutu. Banyamulenge Tutsis join with rebel leader Kabila to form the ADFL. Aided by the new Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA), they quickly capture much of eastern Zaire, and by the spring of 1997, they take the capital, Kinshasa, while Mobutu is abroad for medical treatment.

1997: Mobutu surrenders power and flees into exile in Togo. Eight days later Kabila declares himself president of the renamed Democratic Republic of the Congo.

1998: In June, Kabila sets a deadline for all Rwandan troops to leave the Congo. However, Kabila faces a dilemma: The RPA was instrumental in Kabila’s victory over Mobutu, and Rwanda is eager to maintain a presence in the Congo so it can stop Hutu guerrillas from using the refugee camps as bases from which to raid Rwanda. In August, Banyamulenge Tutsi soldiers, many loyal to their Rwandan officers, rebel against Kabila. The rebellion spreads: Rwanda and Uganda back various rebel groups, and Angola, Namibia and Zimbabwe send troops to assist Kabila, launching what would be the beginning of Congo’s civil war. The U.N. commission on illegal traffic in Congo’s natural resources finds all foreign troops to be guilty of looting the Congo. Kabila’s use of interahamwe as mercenaries against the Congolese contributes to the division and hatred of Rwanda in parts of the country that had had no other contact.

October 1998: The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda sentences former mayor Jean-Paul Akayesu to three life sentences for genocide and crimes against humanity and for other violations, including rape and encouraging widespread sexual violence. This was the first time that an international court had punished sexual violence in a civil war and that rape had been declared an act of genocide.

1999: Rifts emerge between Congolese Liberation Movement rebels supported by Uganda and Rally for Congolese Democracy rebels backed by Rwanda. In an attempt to end a war that had pulled in six countries and dozens of rebel factions, all sides agree to end hostilities with a cease-fire. The Lusaka Peace Accord calls for a joint military commission of rebels and government, the deployment of U.N. peacekeepers, the beginning of a political dialogue and eventual elections.

2000: The U.N. Security Council authorizes a 5,500-strong U.N. force to monitor the cease-fire, but fighting continued. The U.N. force later grows to 17,000, the largest in the world. Despite the size of the army, violence is still prevalent.

2001: Kabila is assassinated by his bodyguard and succeeded by his son, Joseph. The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia convicts Dragoljub Kunarac for rape, torture and enslavement. This is the first decision by an international tribunal to hold that the systematic rape of women during war constitutes a war crime under international humanitarian law.

2002: Mount Nyiragongo erupts and devastates much of the city of Goma. Rwanda and Uganda agree to troop withdrawals from the Congo. Joseph Kabila signs a peace agreement with rebel groups, giving them portfolios in an interim government, including the vice-presidency. The Belgian government officially apologizes for its role in the assassination of Patrice Lumumba.

2003: President Kabila signs a transitional constitution into law until elections can take place. Massacres continue in the eastern Congo as Rwandan Hutu militiamen who fear reprisals if they return to their home country attack civilians in order to get food and money. An interim parliament is elected and inaugurated.

2004: An attempted coup in Kinshasa fails. There is fighting in the east between the Congolese army and renegade soldiers from a former pro-Rwanda rebel group. Rwanda denies being behind the mutiny.

April 2004: The U.N. Commission on Human Rights declares sexual rights as human rights.

2005: On International Women’s Day (March 8), Alison Des Forges, senior advisor to Human Rights Watch’s Africa Division, releases a report on sexual violence in the Congo, urging the Congolese government to take greater steps in prosecution of wartime rape.

2005: Voters approve a new constitution, which limits the president to two five-year terms and paves the way for national elections.

2006: Thousands are displaced in the northeast as the army and U.N. peacekeepers step up the drive to disarm irregular forces ahead of elections. Following a run-off vote in the Congo’s first democratic election for a new leader since 1960, Joseph Kabila defeats rebel leader Jean Pierre Bemba. In April, a military court in Mbandaka finds seven army officers guilty of mass rape of more than 100 women at Songo Mboyo in 2003; this is the first time rape is tried as a crime against humanity in the Congo. In June, the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) reports that about 25,000 Congolese women have been raped in the course of the country’s ongoing violence. However, this number only includes women who have reported the violations and is likely much higher. In December, forces of General Laurent Nkunda and the U.N.-backed army clash in a North Kivu province, which prompts some 50,000 people to flee. The U.N. Security Council expresses concern.

April 2007: The Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda and Burundi relaunch the regional economic bloc Great Lakes Countries Economic Community.

May 2007: The United Nations investigates allegations of gold and arms trafficking by the U.N. peacekeepers in the Ituri region.

June 2007: The Arch Bishop of Bukavu, Monsignor Francois-Xavier Mavoy, warns that war can again break out in the east. Later that month, radio Okapi broadcaster Serge Maheshe is shot dead in Bukavu. He was the third journalist killed in the country since 2005.

2007: Although fighting has decreased in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, armed groups loyal to opposition leader Bemba continue to clash with government forces, despite Bemba’s departure for Portugal (ending the three-week stalemate in Kinshasa, where he had taken shelter in the South African Embassy). Local violence also continues in the eastern part of the country, where Tutsi, Hutu and Mai Mai militia and the national army all exact a heavy toll on civilians.

Sources:
CIA World Factbook;
Country Profile for the Congo; “World’s Apart: The Roots of Regional Conflicts”, www.Britannica.com
www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/congo.htm;
www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/rwanda.htm;
“Key Events in Congo’s History”, International News: Associated Press. July 26, 2006; www.unitedhumanrights.org;
http://www.madre.org/articles/int/b10/sexualrights.html
http://news.amnesty.org/index/ENGPOL300202004;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/country_profiles/1072684.stm
www.un.org/News/dh/latest/Congoongo.htm.