Genocide in the Democratic Republic in Congo

Running head: GENOCIDE IN THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC IN CONGO
GENOCIDE IN THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC IN CONGO
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1GENOCIDE IN THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC IN CONGO
GENOCIDE IN THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC IN CONGO
The term ‘Genocide’ owes its etymological origin to two Greek terms, ‘genos’ and ‘cide’
meaning a particular race or tribe or a social collectivity, and killing in huge numbers
respectively. The term genocide had first found mention in the year 1944, in the book of Raphael
Lemkin, ‘Axis Rule in Occupied Europe’, based against the background of the Holocaust of the
Jews carried out in Nazi Germany in the pre second world war period (Koddenbrock 2015).
Two years later, in 1946 the United Nations Organizations had declared genocide as am
international crime which was defined as an act of extermination perpetrated on a particular
social and ethnic group categorically as a repercussion of war time belligerence. With the
passage of time the definition of genocide has broadened and had become more comprehensive.
The current definition of genocide stipulates that genocide is an act which is aimed at not just
jeopardizing the life of a particular social collectivity but is also oriented towards ensuring that
the population of that community does not get the scope to multiply itself in number any further.
Genocide has been ruled as an act which is perpetrated not just in times of war but also in times
when actual war does not take place (Koddenbrock 2015).
The new broadened definition of genocide provides the basis for comprehending the
ongoing struggle that is going on in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo. The
nation had been wrought with war in 1996 and in 1998 respectively. The war has ended but the
political instability still continues in the nation, especially in the eastern part. This report shall be
providing an account of the humanitarian programme that have taken place in the nation.

2GENOCIDE IN THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC IN CONGO
HISTORY OF ARMED CONFLICT IN THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC IN
CONGO
The 1996 war in Congo was a direct repercussion of the genocide in Rwanda and in
1998, the number of belligerent factions had increased involving seven African nations and
several other militias, thereby worsening the situation further (Ventevogel et al., 2015). The war
has ceased but the situation of political instability continues since the FARDC military force
continues to perpetrate violence on the people residing on the eastern part of the nation
categorically which is badly affected even today despite a civilian government being at the helm
of affairs in the nation. The system of power sharing between civilian government and the
Congolese military has allowed the armed forces to exert its influence in the eastern part of the
nation where it wages atrocities on a regular basis (Koddenbrock 2015).
SITUATION IN THE EASTERN PART OF THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC IN
CONGO
The worst affected section of the society in the Democratic Republic of Congo are the
women who become the victims of sexual assault and the fruit of their labour are illegally take
away from them by the military personnel thereby further leading them to empoverishment. The
women who undergo sexual assault become stigmatized in the society and there have been
several instances whereby the sexual assault by the armed forces have rendered the victim
incapable of giving birth to a child which had further led them to ostracization ad discrimination
(Mertens and Pardy 2017). The eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo is wrought
with ethnic violence whereby each of the tribes consider the others a potential threat to their own
existence and in order to bring the conflict under control, the Congolese army had been deployed