Ottawa Helped Fuel Congo’s Crisis — Then Billed You for the Relief

(Image: Arlette Bashizi)

Canada pledged more than $116 million in March to support humanitarian and peace efforts in Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)—a move Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly framed as part of Canada’s commitment to human rights. But internal records and past spending decisions reveal something far more unsettling—though hardly surprising: Canadian aid has been entangled with forces accused of driving the very crisis it claims to address, including a militia linked to mass atrocities and the recruitment of child soldiers.

Simply put: Canadian taxpayers have funded both the cleanup and, perhaps inadvertently, the mess itself.

The new funding includes more than $41 million for the DRC. Most of the money is earmarked for United Nations agencies, the Red Cross and NGOs to deliver aid to displaced civilians and survivors of gender-based violence.

But the crisis this aid seeks to address is not simply the result of internal conflict. A growing body of evidence points to Rwanda as a central actor. Its military is widely reported to be backing the M23 rebel group, which has seized parts of Goma and other areas in eastern Congo. M23 has been accused of massacres, sexual violence and the recruitment of child soldiers—all of which are driving displacement.

As of late January 2025, fighting continued across Goma and surrounding regions. While M23 and Rwandan forces had taken control of sections of the city, Congolese government troops and local self-defence militias were still resisting. Protests erupted in Kinshasa, Beni, Bukavu and university campuses, with citizens demanding accountability from their government and an end to foreign interference.

Aftermath of a clash in Goma (Image: aa.com.tr).

Rwanda’s Role—and Canada’s Support

Western powers, including the United Nations, United States, and European Union, have publicly condemned Rwanda’s support for the M23 rebel group. A 2022 UN investigation documented Rwandan troop movements and weapons transfers inside Congolese territory. The US State Department called on Rwanda to cease support for M23 and withdraw its forces, while the European Parliament passed a formal resolution in early 2023 denouncing Rwanda’s involvement and urging sanctions. While these statements have been forceful in tone, they’ve remained largely symbolic.

Until recently, Canada has remained silent, despite Rwandan forces being linked to M23, a group accused of massacres, sexual violence, and the recruitment of child soldiers. That silence reflects years of Canadian support for the Rwandan government.

In fact, Canada recently expanded both its financial and diplomatic engagement with Rwanda. In July 2023, then–International Development Minister Harjit Sajjan and other Canadian officials travelled to Kigali for the Women Deliver Conference, where Sajjan announced an additional $200 million in global funding for projects he said would “uphold and promote” the health and rights of women and girls around the world.

During the visit, Canadian delegates met with Rwanda’s ministers of health and agriculture to discuss ongoing partnerships in public health and food security. These meetings took place at a time when Rwanda’s backing of M23 had already been documented in multiple UN reports and condemned by numerous Western governments.

Sajjan also visited Rwanda in 2022, when Canada announced it would open an embassy in Rwanda’s capital. At the time, Global Affairs Canada described the move as a way to “combat Russian influence”—omitting any reference to Rwanda’s involvement in regional conflict zones and human rights violations.

Harjit Sajjan in Rwanda, 2022 (Image: Global Affairs Canada).

Canada Inadvertently Funds M23

Also in 2023, Global Affairs Canada approved up to $19.1 million in funding for the Dallaire Institute for Children, Peace and Security, despite a departmental memo raising “significant risks” due to the institute’s close ties with the Rwandan military. As mentioned, that military is directly linked to M23, which UN investigators say has targeted children for recruitment.

The Dallaire Institute, based at Dalhousie University, operates its African training centre in Rwanda, where it works closely with the country’s armed forces to pursue its stated mission: ending the use of child soldiers. Yet according to reporting by the Globe and Mail, UN experts interviewed 15 captured or surrendered M23 combatants of Congolese origin. Most were described as “very young”—including several children—and said they were lured into the group with payments of just US$50 to US$100.

Still, the full $19.1 million in federal funding was approved by Harjit Sajjan. Two weeks later, he met with Rwandan President Paul Kagame.

M23 militia (Image: Black Agenda Report).

A Regime with Friends in the West

Paul Kagame has ruled Rwanda for more than three decades through a dominant-party system tightly controlled by the Rwandan Patriotic Front. While opposition candidates exist, those who challenge Kagame’s authority have been jailed, exiled, or barred from running. Elections have routinely delivered near-unanimous victories—often 98 to 99 percent.

Yet until recently Kagame has been a favoured ally of Canada. In 2017, Canada’s High Commissioner publicly congratulated him on winning re-election with nearly 99 per cent of the vote. In 2022, former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau met with Kagame in Kigali during a Commonwealth summit, where he emphasized the importance of “democracy,” while avoiding any mention of Rwanda’s regional aggression or domestic repression.

And that measly $19.1 million previously mentioned? It pales in comparison to the more than $281 million in international assistance Canada has directed toward Rwanda since 2017. Yes—you read that right—$281 million.

Resource Extraction

Despite having limited mineral reserves of its own, Rwanda exports significant volumes of coltan, and tungsten—much of it believed to originate from eastern Congo. UN investigators have long pointed to Rwanda’s military involvement and support for proxy militias as a strategic means of controlling mine sites and smuggling routes.

M23’s resurgence in 2021 coincided with rising global demand for minerals critical to “clean energy,” digital technologies, and defence systems. An infrastructure initiative known as the “Green Corridor,” promoted by Congolese President Félix Tshisekedi at the World Economic Forum in Davos and backed by Western donors, aims to streamline the export of these resources under the banner of sustainable development. But critics warn that without democratic oversight and local control, such initiatives risk deepening the cycle of foreign exploitation that has long been present in the region.

A Long History of Exploitation

The current violence in eastern Congo is not an isolated event. It is the latest chapter in more than a century of foreign intervention and resource-driven conflict. From Belgian colonization and the rubber trade to Cold War–era coups and multinational mining operations, Congo has long been viewed as a source of wealth for others—and a battleground for those seeking to extract it.

Canada’s involvement in the region deepened in 1996, when Rwanda and Uganda invaded eastern Congo, then known as Zaire, to target Hutu militias that had fled after the Rwandan genocide. Around the same time, Canada offered to lead a UN mission focused on the regional refugee crisis. Though never fully deployed, the proposal coincided with the invasion—and occurred as international scrutiny of Rwanda’s actions remained conspicuously muted. The Rwanda–Uganda incursion marked the beginning of the First Congo War, which toppled Mobutu, drew in eight countries, and left millions dead. Rwanda and its proxies have continued to intervene in eastern Congo—often with minimal pushback from Western governments, including Canada.

Canadian involvement extended to the economic front as well. A 2002 UN panel named eight Canadian mining companies in a report on the illegal exploitation of Congo’s natural resources, citing widespread abuses. The report called for Ottawa to investigate the companies’ activities. No inquiry was ever launched.

Today, that history continues in new forms. Diplomatic alliances and foreign aid still shape the balance of power in the region. And while conditions may not be as horrific as the rubber-quota amputations of the Belgian colonial era, child labour and human rights abuses remain widespread in the DRC’s mining sector.

(Nsala of Wala stares at a severed hand and foot—reportedly those of his young daughter, mutilated by Belgian agents enforcing rubber quotas. Photographer: Alice Seeley Harris, 1904.)

Ongoing Accountability Concerns at Global Affairs

Remember that $200 million Sajjan announced at the Women Deliver Conference in Rwanda—the money he said would “uphold and promote” the health and rights of women and girls around the world? Well, it turns out Global Affairs doesn’t have a clue how most of those projects are being used.

The same goes for the new funding announced by Joly for the DRC in March of this year, which was said to support survivors of gender-based violence.

A scathing 2023 report by Canada’s Auditor General cast serious doubt on whether such commitments are actually being met.

The report found that Global Affairs at the time was unable to demonstrate how billions in bilateral aid were improving outcomes for women and girls. Incomplete or missing project files made it impossible to track the efficacy of funded projects. In some cases, annual reports to Parliament captured results for only half of them.

While the department told Coastal Front it has “since committed to improving oversight,” it offered no further details—even when pressed. None whatsoever. The lack of transparency undermines Canada’s credibility, particularly when aid is directed toward politically sensitive partnerships with authoritarian regimes.

A Jarring Contradiction

Canada did recently condemn Rwanda for its actions in the DRC. But this comes after years of deepening partnerships, expanding funding, and remaining diplomatically aligned with the very government it now denounces. And now, taxpayers will bankroll the cleanup. The result is a contradiction of astronomical proportions: Canadian taxpayers are being forced to help repair the damage in Congo—more than $41 million committed in March alone—after their government spent years supporting one of the forces driving that very instability. And given Global Affairs’ track record of failing to measure its funding’s impact, Canadians won’t know if the new funding will actually improve the lives of the Congolese people.

What a dumpster fire.

And this mess is far from unique. Canada’s foreign aid system has long operated in ways that obscure accountability, mask geopolitical motives, and entrench the very conditions it claims to solve. Billions continue to flow through murky channels with little oversight or measurable impact. Coastal Front’s mandate is to follow the money trail—and with respect to Global Affairs, it consistently leads to one place: a cesspool devoid of accountability, transparency, or tangible benefit for those forced to fund it.