Portal:Democratic Republic of the Congo

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The Democratic Republic of the Congo Portal

Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo	Coat of Arms of the Democratic Republic of the Congo

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (also abbreviated as DR Congo,DRC, the DROC, and RDC (in French)) is a country in Central Africa. By land area, the DRC is the second-largest country in Africa and the 11th-largest in the world. With a population of around 105 million, the Democratic Republic of the Congo is the most populous Francophone country in the world. The national capital and largest city is Kinshasa, which is also the economic center. The country is bordered by the Republic of the Congo, Central African Republic, South Sudan, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania (across Lake Tanganyika), Zambia, Angola, the Cabinda exclave of Angola, and the South Atlantic Ocean.

Centered on the Congo Basin, the territory of the DRC was first inhabited by Central African foragers around 90,000 years ago and was reached by the Bantu expansion about 3,000 years ago. In the west, the Kingdom of Kongo ruled around the mouth of the Congo River from the 14th to 19th centuries. In the northeast, center, and east, the kingdoms of Azande, Luba, and Lunda ruled from the 16th and 17th centuries to the 19th century. King Leopold II of Belgium formally acquired rights to the Congo territory from the colonial nations of Europe in 1885 and declared the land his private property, naming it the Congo Free State. From 1885 to 1908, his colonial military forced the local population to produce rubber and committed widespread atrocities. In 1908, Leopold ceded the territory, which thus became a Belgian colony.

Congo achieved independence from Belgium on 30 June 1960 and was immediately confronted by a series of secessionist movements, the assassination of Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba, and the seizure of power by Mobutu Sese Seko in a 1965 coup d'état. Mobutu renamed the country Zaire in 1971 and imposed a harsh personalist dictatorship until his overthrow in 1997 by the First Congo War. The country then had its name changed back and was confronted by the Second Congo War from 1998 to 2003, which resulted in the deaths of 5.4 million people. The war ended under President Joseph Kabila, who governed the country from 2001 to 2019, under whom human rights in the country remained poor and included frequent abuses such as forced disappearances, torture, arbitrary imprisonment and restrictions on civil liberties. Following the 2018 general election, in the country's first peaceful transition of power since independence, Kabila was succeeded as president by Félix Tshisekedi, who has served as president since. Since 2015, the Eastern DR Congo has been the site of an ongoing military conflict in Kivu.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo is extremely rich in natural resources but has suffered from political instability, a lack of infrastructure, corruption, and centuries of both commercial and colonial extraction and exploitation, followed by more than 60 years of independence, with little widespread development. Besides the capital Kinshasa, the two next largest cities, Lubumbashi and Mbuji-Mayi, are both mining communities. The DRC's largest export is raw minerals, with China accepting over 50% of its exports in 2019. In 2021, DR Congo's level of human development was ranked 179th out of 191 countries by the Human Development Index and is classed as a least developed country by the UN. , following two decades of various civil wars and continued internal conflicts, around 600,000 Congolese refugees were still living in neighbouring countries. Two million children risk starvation, and the fighting has displaced 4.5 million people. The country is a member of the United Nations, Non-Aligned Movement, African Union, COMESA, Southern African Development Community, Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie, and Economic Community of Central African States. (Full article...)

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The Transitional Government of the Democratic Republic of Congo was tasked with moving from the state riven by the Second Congo War (1998–2003) to a government based upon a constitution agreed on by consensus. In 2001, President Laurent Kabila was assassinated, and his son Joseph Kabila was named head of state. (Full article...)

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The following are images from various Democratic Republic of the Congo-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1A Hemba male statue (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 2Government troops near Goma during the M23 rebellion in May 2013 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 3Ituri Rainforest (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 4Ugandan President Idi Amin Visits Zaire and Meets Mobutu during The Shaba I Conflict (from History of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 5Ndeemba Mask (from Culture of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 6Kasaï-Central province, where the Kamwina Nsapu militia clashes with security forces began. (from History of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 7Patrice Lumumba, founding member and leader of the MNC (from History of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 8A map of the major Bantu languages in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (from Culture of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 9Refugees in the Congo (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 10Roman Catholic Church in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 11Flag of CNDP (from History of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 12Democratic Republic of the Congo map of Köppen climate classification (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 13Franco Luambo and his OK Jazz orchestra performing live at Zaire 74 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 14Arab slave raid on Nyangwe, circa 1870 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 15Memory Board (lukasa) - Luba Kingdom (from Culture of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 16Change in per capita GDP of Congo, 1950–2018. Figures are inflation-adjusted to 2011 International dollars. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 17The map of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 18Branhamist worshippers in Kinshasa (from Culture of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 19Mobutu Sese Seko and Richard Nixon in Washington, D.C., 1973. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 20Masque féminin Ngaady a mwaash, XIX-XXe siècles (from Culture of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 21Joseph Kabila was President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo from January 2001 to January 2019. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 22Population fleeing their villages due to fighting between FARDC and rebels groups, Sake North Kivu 30 April 2012 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 23Train from Lubumbashi arriving in Kindu on a newly refurbished line. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 24DR Congo's Human Development Index scores, 1970–2010. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 25President Félix Tshisekedi with the president of neighbouring Republic of the Congo Denis Sassou Nguesso in 2020; both wear face masks due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 26Map of rail network (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 27Development of life expectancy in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 28People fleeing their villages due to fighting between FARDC and rebel groups, North Kivu, 2012 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 29Mobutu Sese Seko (from History of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 30Democratic Republic of the Congo's population between 1960 and 2017. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 31Collecting firewood in Basankusu. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 32View of Leopoldville Station and Port in 1884 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 33The Sts. Peter and Paul Cathedral, Lubumbashi (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 34Belligerents of the Second Congo War (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 35Breakdown of the largest ethnic groups in DRC (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 361908 photograph of a married Christian couple. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 37A Congolese Christian. (from Culture of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 38Congolese soldiers being trained by UN personnel. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 39Mobutu with the Dutch Prince Bernhard in Kinshasa in 1973 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 40Found in the Congolian rainforests, the okapi was unknown to science until 1901 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 41Map of the Kingdom of Kongo (from History of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 42A group of demobilized child soldiers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 43Congo Free State official Camille Coquilhat with the Bangala chief Mata-Buiké in c. 1888 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 44The leader of ABAKO, Joseph Kasa-Vubu, first democratically elected President of Congo-Léopoldville (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 45A woman carrying bananas. (from Culture of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 46Our Lady of Peace Cathedral in Bukavu (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 47President Joseph Kabila with U.S. President Barack Obama in August 2014 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 48Rough diamonds ≈1 to 1.5 mm in size from DR Congo (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 49Patrice Lumumba, first democratically elected Prime Minister of the Congo-Léopoldville, was murdered by Belgian-supported Katangan separatists in 1961. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 50The endangered mountain gorilla; half of its population live in the DRC's Virunga National Park, making the park a critical habitat for these animals. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 51Children mutilated during King Leopold II's rule (from History of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 52Abeti Masikini in 1978 (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 53The four Bantu languages with elevated "national" status. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 54Force Publique soldiers in the Belgian Congo in 1918. At its peak, the Force Publique had around 19,000 Congolese soldiers, led by 420 Belgian officers. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Image 55A classroom in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. (from Democratic Republic of the Congo)

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The Free Republic of the Congo (French: République Libre du Congo), often referred to as Congo-Stanleyville, was a short-lived rival government to the Republic of the Congo (Congo-Léopoldville) based in the eastern Congo and led by Antoine Gizenga.

Following Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba's deposition in September 1960 in the midst of the Congo Crisis, many of his supporters became disillusioned with the government in Léopoldville (modern-day Kinshasa). Under Lumumba's deputy, Antoine Gizenga, leftists organised in Stanleyville (modern-day Kisangani) and in December declared their own government to be the legal successor to the prime minister's administration. Gizenga quickly amassed military strength and, by February 1961, had occupied vast portions of Congolese territory. In August, negotiations between the two governments resulted in Gizenga agreeing to stand down. He returned to the office of deputy under the new prime minister, Cyrille Adoula. Still, Gizenga distanced himself from the central administration and rebuilt his own political and military power. The rival government was not fully reintegrated into the Republic of the Congo until Gizenga was arrested in January 1962. (Full article...)

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Swedish UN peacekeepers led by Major Sture Fagerström plan their attack on the town of Kamina during the operation

Operation Grandslam was an offensive undertaken by United Nations peacekeeping forces from 28 December 1962 to 15 January 1963 against the forces of the State of Katanga, a secessionist state rebelling against the Republic of the Congo (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo) in Central Africa. The Katangese forces were decisively defeated and Katanga was forcibly reintegrated into the Congo.

The United Nations had tried several times to reconcile the government of the Congo with the State of Katanga, which had declared independence under Moïse Tshombe with Belgian support in 1960. Though initially limiting its actions, the United Nations Operation in the Congo became increasingly impatient towards Katanga and Tshombe, drawing up plans to resolve the situation through force. Tshombe continuously violated agreements he had made with the United Nations and the Congolese government by building up his forces and bringing foreign mercenaries into the conflict. The situation reached a breaking point in December 1962 when Katangese gendarmes attacked peacekeeping forces in Katanga. United Nations Secretary-General U Thant authorised a retaliatory offensive to eliminate secessionist opposition. (Full article...)