Belgium and Rwanda have resumed diplomatic relations 18 months after \u200bbreaking ties due to a dispute over the conflict in \u200ceastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).<\/p>\n
Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prevot and Rwanda’s Foreign Ministry both posted the news on X alongside photos of Prevot and his Rwandan \u200bCounterpart Olivier Nduhungirehe in New York, where the United Nations General \u200bAssembly (UNGA) is taking place.<\/p>\n
The two countries expelled each other’s \u2060diplomats in March 2025 as relations deteriorated over the conflict in \u200bRwanda’s neighbour.<\/p>\n
The AFC\/M23 rebels control large parts of North and South Kivu \u200bprovinces following their early 2025 advance, during which they captured Goma and Bukavu, eastern DRC’s two largest cities.<\/p>\n
The UN and Western governments say the group is backed \u200bby Rwanda, which Kigali denies.<\/p>\n
Rwanda says it is defending itself against \u200bthe threat from a Hutu militia, which it says is fighting with the Congolese \u200cmilitary. \u2060Both DRC and Rwanda are former Belgian colonies.
\nIn a joint statement on Tuesday, Belgium and Rwanda said the two foreign ministers held a series of meetings and informal contacts over recent months, addressing a \u200bnumber of differences \u200band misunderstandings “in a \u2060constructive spirit”.<\/p>\n
They also thanked Qatar for facilitating a first meeting in June 2025 and said they planned \u200bto reopen their respective embassies soon.
\nPrevot wrote on X \u200bthat this \u2060was an important step “in a world marked by growing tensions”.<\/p>\n
“Restoring diplomatic relations between states does not mean abandoning our position, but having structured channels \u2060for \u200bdialogue, and I will continue to defend \u200bthe territorial integrity and sovereignty of the DRC,” he said.<\/p>\n
–Reuters–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":20582,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[],"class_list":["post-46224","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"The two countries expelled each other's \u2060diplomats in March 2025.","published_date":"","news_description":"The two countries expelled each other's \u2060diplomats in March 2025.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/46224","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/46224\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46225,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/46224\/revisions\/46225"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46224"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=46224"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}