Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda

The Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (Forces démocratiques de libération du Rwanda, FDLR) is an armed rebel group active in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. As an ethnic Hutu group opposed to the ethnic Tutsi influence, the FDLR is one of the last factions of Rwandan rebels active in the Congo. It was founded through an amalgamation of other groups of Rwandan refugees in September 2000, including the former Army for the Liberation of Rwanda (ALiR), under the leadership of Paul Rwarakabije. It was active during the latter phases of the Second Congo War and the subsequent insurgencies in Kivu. As of December 2009, Major General Sylvestre Mudacumura was the FDLR's overall military commander. He was the former deputy commander of the FAR Presidential Guard in Rwanda in 1994. Mudacumura was killed by DRC security in 2019. The FDLR made a partial separation between its military and civilian wings in September 2003 when a formal armed branch, the Forces Combattantes Abacunguzi (FOCA), was created. According to the U.S. National Counterterrorism Center, the FDLR is believed to be responsible for about a dozen terrorist attacks committed in 2009. These acts of terrorism have killed hundreds of civilians in Eastern Congo. Before ALiR merged with the FDLR in September 2000, the military configuration was as follows: ALiR was split into two divisions, each containing three brigades of about 2000 men (a total of 12,000 men). The first division was stationed in North Kivu and the second around the Kahuzi Biega forest (in the Shabunda, Mwenga, Kalehe territories) and in South Kivu. The FDLR troops consisted of one division of three brigades, plus one more incomplete brigade. After fighting for Kinshasa, troop numbers were down to little more than 7000 to 8000 men, according to the FDLR. But this figure does not take into account the probable recruitment and training of three supplementary brigades, as reported and denounced by the Rwandan government.