# Washington Accords for Peace and Prosperity Signed **4 December 2025** at the US Institute of Peace by presidents [[Félix Tshisekedi]] and [[Paul Kagame]], with Trump presiding and the heads of Kenya, Angola, Burundi and Togo plus Qatari and Emirati foreign ministers attending. > [!warning] Two Washington signings, routinely conflated > **27 June 2025** — the **DRC–Rwanda Peace Agreement**, signed by *foreign ministers*, Rubio presiding. Rwandan troop withdrawal, an end to DRC support for the [[FDLR]], a Joint Security Coordination Mechanism, and a commitment to a Regional Economic Integration Framework covering critical-minerals trade. **[[M23]] was not a party.** > > **4 December 2025** — the **Washington Accords**, signed by *presidents*, consolidating the June agreement, the 7 November REIF technical agreement, and the bilateral US instruments — including the [[US-DRC Strategic Partnership Agreement]] the same day. ## What it commits the parties to Rwandan withdrawal within 90 days; Congolese neutralisation of the FDLR; joint security coordination and verification; and the **Regional Economic Integration Framework**, covering energy infrastructure, mining, national parks and tourism, public health, and **cross-border mineral supply chains**. The State Department framed it as unlocking "opportunities for the U.S. private sector." No dollar figures appear in the text. A parallel Qatar-mediated **Doha track** ran between Kinshasa and the AFC/M23 through 2025 — a declaration of principles in July, prisoner-exchange and ceasefire-verification protocols in September and October, and a non-binding eight-pillar framework on 15 November. Talks moved to Switzerland in spring 2026. ## Has it held? No. - **10 December 2025** — M23 captures Uvira, six days after the signing. - **31 January 2026** — drone attack on Kisangani airport. - **2 March 2026** — the US designates the **Rwanda Defence Force as an institution** plus four generals for "blatant violations of the Washington Peace Accords." Rwanda calls the sanctions one-sided. - **March 2026** — M23 assessed at ~27,000 combatants, a fivefold increase since early 2025. It refuses to disarm. - **25 June 2026** — the US designates the Gasabo Gold Refinery network for moving gold out of South Kivu with RDF and M23 involvement. - **24 July 2026, Paris** — Rwanda formally rejects the DRC's negotiated FDLR demobilisation plan, calling it "crude manipulation." - **August 2026** — M23 still holds Goma and Bukavu. Fighting continues on the southern and north-western axes. Human Rights Watch's assessment: "promises but little more," with an international response that has been "haphazard and uncoordinated" and has "emboldened abusers on all sides." On the one-year anniversary of the June agreement, Goma residents told reporters "these agreements have produced absolutely no results." ## The structural critique The peace agreement and the minerals partnership were signed **the same day**, and the REIF contemplates Rwanda as a hub for routing eastern Congolese minerals. Critics — the Oakland Institute, PRIF, the Egmont Institute — make a straightforward argument: as long as the architecture rewards Rwanda as a processing and export node for minerals that come out of the conflict zone, **M23 has no economic reason to give up the mines that fund it, and Kigali has no economic reason to make it.** The counter-argument is that commercial interdependence is precisely what gives Washington leverage it did not previously have, and that the March and June 2026 sanctions demonstrate the leverage is being used. Both are being tested in real time. As of August 2026 the sanctions have escalated, the fighting has not stopped, and no troops have withdrawn. ## See also [[US-DRC Strategic Partnership Agreement]] · [[M23 Offensive of 2025]] · [[Rwanda]] · [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]] · [[Conflict Minerals Hub]]