Africa File, March 6, 2025: Burundi and Rwanda Truce in Eastern DRC Despite M23 Advance; SAF Targets RSF Supply Lines in Darfur; Sahelian Jihadists Tap Trans-Saharan Networks

Africa File, March 6, 2025: Burundi and Rwanda Truce in Eastern DRC Despite M23 Advance; SAF Targets RSF Supply Lines in Darfur; Sahelian Jihadists Tap Trans-Saharan Networks

Authors: Liam Karr, Kathryn Tyson, and Yale Ford

Contributors: Jean-Philip Banane and John Reece

Data Cutoff: March 6, 2025, at 10 a.m.

Editor's Note: The Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute publishes these updates with support from the Institute for the Study of War.

The Africa File provides regular analysis and assessments of major developments regarding state and nonstate actors’ activities in Africa that undermine regional stability and threaten US personnel and interests.

Key Takeaways:

• Democratic Republic of the Congo. Rwandan-backed M23 rebels have halted their southward advance along the Burundian border in South Kivu after Burundi and Rwanda likely reached a deal to deconflict in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which decreases the risk of a wider regional war between Burundi and Rwanda in the immediate term. M23 has made significant advances southwest of the South Kivu provincial capital of Bukavu that create opportunities for the group to advance farther into the interior of South Kivu and neighboring Maniema province. M23’s control of Kamituga would allow the group to tax and control the production and trade of gold.
• Sudan: The Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) are setting conditions on multiple axes to break the Rapid Support Forces’ (RSF’s) hold on western Sudan. The SAF and SAF-aligned militia groups reinforced a second front north of el Fasher, the capital city of North Darfur, which the SAF could use to support its campaign to disrupt RSF supply lines into el Fasher. SAF-RSF clashes in western Sudan will almost certainly cause significant civilian casualties due to the RSF’s pattern of retaliatory, ethnically based violence against civilians. The SAF also advanced against RSF forces in eastern Khartoum as it continued its offensive to retake the capital city and consolidate control over the eastern bank of the Nile River.
• Sahel: Al Qaeda’s and IS’s Sahelian affiliates are increasing their influence over trans-Saharan trafficking nodes, which will likely strengthen their links into North Africa. IS Sahel Province and Jama’at Nusrat al Islam wa al Muslimeen are almost certainly collaborating with local actors as an entry point to expand their areas of operation. Greater influence over trans-Saharan networks will expand these groups’ external reach and increase the threat—particularly from IS—of external plots in North Africa and potentially Europe.

Assessments:

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Rwandan-backed M23 rebels have halted their southward advance along the Burundian border in South Kivu after Burundi and Rwanda likely reached a deal to deconflict in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which decreases the risk of a wider regional war between Burundi and Rwanda in the immediate term. M23 had advanced as far south as Sange—a village on the Sange River that lies 25 miles (40 kilometers) north of Uvira on the RN5—at the peak of its advance on February 19.[1] M23 forces withdrew from these areas to Kamanyola—the southernmost village on the DRC-Rwanda border that is 25 miles north of Sange--in the following days, however. Burundian forces and pro-Congolese militias advanced unopposed through Sange to Luvungi—a village nearly 20 miles north of Sange along the Burundi-DRC border—on February 23.[2] The Vatican news agency Agenzia Fides reported on March 4 that pro-Congolese government militias controlled as far north as Katogota village, which is separated from Kamanyola by the Luvini River.[3]

The control shift is likely part of a deal between Burundi and Rwanda to deconflict and control their own respective sides of the DRC border. The Burundian advance came after French investigative outlet Africa Intelligence reported that an unspecified Burundian official visited Kigali in mid-February and reached a verbal agreement with Rwanda.[4] The Burundian president said on February 16 that he received assurances that Rwanda would not attack Burundi.[5] The bloodless nature of the land swap further indicates that Burundi and Rwanda orchestrated the transfer of territory.

Burundi and Rwanda’s efforts to deconflict in the eastern DRC decrease the risk of a wider regional war between the two countries in the immediate term. Burundi and Rwanda are rivals in the eastern DRC, and both view their competition as potentially existential. Burundi has collaborated with ...
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