Congo’s ‘Other’ Conflict Kills Thousands in West Near the Capital

A little-known conflict in the west of the Democratic Republic of Congo is raging close to the country’s capital, Kinshasa, one of the largest cities in Africa.

Nine soldiers and 70 militiamen died in clashes on July 13 in Kinsele, a village 80 miles east of Kinshasa, according to the local authorities. It was the latest surge of violence in an area where thousands of civilians have been killed and more than 550,000 displaced since 2022, according to estimates from humanitarian organizations and United Nations agencies.

The initial spark for the conflict two years ago was a tax dispute between local ethnic groups, the Teke and the Yaka. It has since billowed into a fight over land access, with a bloody trail of summary executions, burned villages and sexual violence.

A militia pretending to defend some of the communities in the area has enlisted child soldiers, forced women to marry their fighters and looted villagers’ crops, sending people fleeing toward Kinshasa, humanitarian groups and U.N. experts say.

This conflict is unfolding 900 miles away from a larger crisis that has plagued eastern Congo for the past three decades, killing about six million people and displacing 60 million others.