Environmental Defenders strongly urges United Nations bodies to hold the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) accountable for the human rights situation facing environmental defenders, journalists, human rights activists, and Indigenous peoples in the country.
The year 2024 is significant for the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s engagement with United Nations (UN) mechanisms. The UN Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) Working Group will assess the human rights situation in the DRC at the end of this year, following the country’s previous review in 2019.
What the Universal Periodic Review means for the DRC
The Universal Periodic Review is a distinctive process of the UN Human Rights Council that requires every UN Member State to undergo a comprehensive evaluation of its human rights record every four and a half years. The UPR gives each State the opportunity to periodically:
- Report on the measures it has taken to improve human rights conditions in the country and to overcome obstacles to the full enjoyment of human rights.
- Receive recommendations from other UN Member States, informed by stakeholder submissions and pre-session reports, for continued improvement.
The DRC will be reviewed at the 47th session of the fourth UPR cycle, scheduled for November 4 to 15, 2024. During its third review in 2019, the DRC received and accepted eight recommendations on protecting human rights defenders, including lawyers, from harassment, ensuring access to justice, and safeguarding lawyers’ freedom of expression. Based on reports and information gathered by Environmental Defenders, the DRC has not effectively implemented the recommendations made in its previous reviews.
Shrinking civic space and press freedom
The DRC has intensified serious violations of the rights to freedom of expression, peaceful assembly, and demonstration. Civic space is at risk of further deterioration as a series of repressive laws target national and international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and human rights defenders (HRDs). Despite the government’s pledge to safeguard journalistic freedom, press freedom and the right to information have been significantly curtailed.
Throughout the 2023 electoral campaign, journalists were systematically subjected to intimidation, harassment, arbitrary arrest, and detention, and their equipment was often seized or vandalized. Journalists reporting on human rights abuses and unlawful killings were especially affected. Stanis Bujakera, deputy publishing director of the Congolese news site Actualite.cd and a correspondent for Jeune Afrique, was arrested on the evening of September 8, 2023, at N’djili airport in Kinshasa as he prepared to travel to Lubumbashi. He was later transferred to Makala prison despite repeated appeals for his release, and charged with spreading false rumors and disseminating false information over an article published by Jeune Afrique that implicated military intelligence in the killing of former minister Chérubin Okende. At the time of this statement, Stanis remained in detention.
Update: Stanis Bujakera was released in March 2024 after a Kinshasa court sentenced him to six months in prison, a term he had already served in pretrial detention.
Environmental Defenders has recorded numerous threats and acts of intimidation against journalists, media workers, human rights defenders, and environmental activists in Ituri and North Kivu provinces in the eastern DRC. These incidents include officers of the Armed Forces of the DRC (FARDC) making explicit threats to harm or kill activists and radio journalists. Journalists’ equipment has also been vandalized while they carried out their work in Bunia, Beni, and Goma. Read more about how Environmental Defenders supports the safety and security of defenders and journalists.
Land rights, Indigenous peoples, and natural resources
Most Congolese rely on natural resources, whether through farming or mining, for their daily survival, which makes access to land essential for people in rural areas. Yet the rights of those who hold land under customary law remain uncertain because of outdated and inadequate legislation, and the legal standing of customary tenure in relation to the central government is still unclear. Although the DRC committed during its second UPR to prioritize the Indigenous Batwa people’s access to land and natural resources, the Batwa continue to face serious barriers. They are often evicted from their ancestral lands, relegated to poorly equipped settlements, or have their rights disregarded by authorities and other actors. The adoption of Law No. 22/030 of July 15, 2022, on the protection and promotion of the rights of Indigenous Pygmy peoples was an important step, but its implementation remains limited. While the government, with support from civil society and NGOs, has begun land law reforms, it remains uncertain how customary land rights will be addressed in the new laws.
Despite the DRC’s wealth of natural resources, violent conflict, political instability, and a lack of transparency in governance have prevented their sustainable and fair use. The involvement of armed groups in mining is well documented, particularly in the eastern provinces, where gold, tin, tantalum, and tungsten (3TG) play a central role in the local economy. Armed groups impose illegal levies, set up barriers around mining sites, and control access to them. The involvement of state personnel, including members of the national army and the Republican Guard, in extracting illicit rents from mining sites worsens the situation. Child labor in the mines also remains widespread.
Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) is still not applied in many communities. As a result, community members struggle to obtain compensation when mining agreements are signed between government institutions and private companies operating on their land. Indigenous peoples and local communities have often been forcibly displaced without compensation, or have entered into agreements with companies without proper consultation and without restitution for the loss of their livelihoods. Artisanal miners are especially vulnerable, working in insecure and precarious conditions, and their ability to negotiate with other actors in the sector is weakened by a lack of organization and formalization.
The DRC lies at the heart of the Congo Basin, the second largest tropical rainforest in the world and home to an exceptional diversity of plant and animal species. The basin includes internationally protected areas recognized by UNESCO as World Heritage Sites, among them Virunga and Salonga National Parks, where resource extraction is prohibited. These areas nonetheless hold reserves of diamonds, timber, coltan, oil, and gas. Although some investors have shown interest in exploiting them, the DRC must preserve the integrity of this vital ecosystem and uphold its obligations under international law.
Legal persecution of defenders in eastern DRC
The evidence shows that the DRC has failed to uphold human rights by inadequately enforcing laws that could protect its citizens. The State has also failed to protect human rights defenders and to guarantee that journalists can work without intimidation, obstruction, harassment, or undue interference, and it has made little effort to ensure the right to a fair trial and equal access to justice and legal aid.
Human rights defenders and environmental activists in the DRC face growing legal persecution. In multiple cases, they have been arrested and detained by the Agence Nationale de Renseignements (ANR), the State intelligence agency, on unfounded grounds such as being considered a threat to national security. As a result, many defenders live with constant concern for their personal safety, which undermines their ability to work effectively.
Civic space in the DRC is restricted and continues to shrink. The areas where Environmental Defenders operates carry substantial risks for environmental, labor, and human rights defenders. Indigenous peoples were disproportionately targeted in a significant number of documented attacks on defenders, often linked to extractive industries, mining, wildlife conservation, hydroelectric dams, and large-scale agriculture.
Staff of several Environmental Defenders partner organizations in North Kivu, South Kivu, and Ituri have recently faced threats or accusations of espionage or rebel collaboration from the ANR. Threats against civil society organizations (CSOs) in Ituri have escalated, as shown by a recent statement by the province’s military governor, who publicly labeled some CSOs as enemies of the provincial administration and a threat to peace in Ituri. An Environmental Defenders partner in Beni, North Kivu, faced legal action and was accused of colluding with the M23 rebel group. In Mambasa territory, Ituri, the local administration has tightened its control over CSO activities and is preparing new regulations requiring NGOs to submit their financial statements to military authorities.
Indigenous peoples in the DRC have almost no political representation, with no Indigenous members currently in either the Senate or the National Assembly. The DRC has yet to make significant progress in guaranteeing the inclusion of Indigenous peoples and women in public institutions. Women defenders face additional risks, as documented in our appeal for the security and protection of women environmental human rights defenders.
Law No. 23/027 on the protection of human rights defenders
The DRC adopted Law No. 23/027 of June 15, 2023, on the protection and accountability of human rights defenders. The law acknowledges the difficult conditions under which HRDs work in the country, and its preamble explicitly affirms the need for legislation to protect them. It also stresses that defenders of human rights and fundamental freedoms must be able to work in a safe and enabling environment, free from violence, threats, reprisals, discrimination, arbitrary arrest and detention, and other persecution by State and non-State actors.
Protection International recognizes that Law No. 23/027 contains positive elements, such as an inclusive definition of human rights defenders and explicit recognition of the need for measures that create an enabling environment for their work. However, it considers that substantial revisions are needed for the law to effectively ensure that defenders “have an environment conducive to the exercise of their activities without fear of violence, threats, reprisals, discrimination, arbitrary arrest and detention, and other persecution by state or non-state actors.”
Our call to the UN and the DRC government
Environmental Defenders calls on UN bodies to hold the DRC accountable for the plight of human rights defenders, environmental activists, and Indigenous peoples whose rights have been violated on all fronts. The government must adopt clear legal measures that recognize the land rights of Indigenous communities and their right to Free, Prior and Informed Consent. The demarcation and official designation of Congolese forests and national parks should include a process specifically designed to identify the lands and territories of Indigenous peoples, so that they are recognized and protected in line with the international treaties the DRC has ratified.
We therefore strongly urge UN bodies to hold the Democratic Republic of the Congo accountable for the human rights situation described above. We also call on the DRC government to explicitly guarantee the protection and security of human rights defenders and to remove every obstacle that restricts their freedom and their work in the country.