The U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned former DRC President Joseph Kabila on April 30, 2026, citing alleged links to the AFC/M23.
What the announcement leaves out tells as much as what it contains.
Kabila was sentenced to death by President Tshisekedi in proceedings his supporters and independent legal observers describe as judicial persecution of a political rival. He relocated to Goma — where more than 13 million Congolese currently live under AFC-administered territory — making his presence there neither exceptional nor conspiratorial.
The U.S. has both the intelligence capacity and the diplomatic weight to investigate what is actually happening in eastern DRC. Sanctioning a persecuted former president who lives among civilians, while the collaboration between Kinshasa's forces and the FDLR — documented by the UN Panel of Experts across multiple reporting cycles and corroborated by independent field investigators — goes unaddressed, is not mediation.
Washington has the tools, the leverage, and the responsibility to help the Great Lakes region reach the durable peace it is fully capable of. That requires investigating the full picture, not selectively sanctioning political figures while strategic facts go unacknowledged.
Source: U.S. Treasury Department, 30 April 2026. Poliscoop editorial analysis.