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THE QUIET VIOLENCE OF PEACE DEALS  
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Marjorie Namara Rugunda
July 12, 2025
Africa is a Country
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_ Trump’s Congo-Rwanda deal is hailed as diplomatic triumph. But
behind the photo ops lies a familiar exchange: African resources for
Western power. _

A REBELLION IN CONGO Laurent Nkunda, center, a rebel leader in Congo,
was an officer in Rwanda's army. It is widely believed that Rwanda
backs Mr. Nkunda; Rwanda denies it., Jerome Delay/Associated Press

 

Peace deals [[link removed]] are
often announced with handshakes, photo ops, smiles, and celebratory
headlines. They are moments of spectacle that are framed as victories
of diplomacy and stability. While some peace deals ought to be
celebrated, behind the press conferences and applause, we must also
ask: What is actually being exchanged in the name of peace? Whose
lives continue to be disposed of in the name of peace deals?

During a press briefing on  Friday, June 27, US President Donald
Trump announced that a peace deal between the Democratic Republic of
Congo and Rwanda has been signed. In his announcement to the press,
Trump stated that though he does not know much about the conflict in
eastern Congo, it was one of the worst wars he has seen and that he
also happened to have someone who was able to settle it—his senior
Africa advisor, Massad Boulos
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He then asserted [[link removed]] that
as part of the deal, the United States will also be getting the
mineral rights from the Congo. While there is much to unpack in the
details of the deal, Trump’s casual remark about securing mineral
rights cannot be overlooked, especially as this agreement, like many
before it that have failed, is being celebrated as a victory not just
for the people of eastern Congo but for the world.

But if war has truly ended, why must peace always come in exchange for
minerals?

This deal, which was finalized in Washington, raises critical
questions about the meaning of peace. Trump claims the conflict has
ended, yet mineral extraction
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the DRC  has long functioned as a form of war, one waged not just
with weapons, but through dispossession. For decades
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Congolese people have lived with the consequences of violent
extraction: displacement, environmental degradation, forced labor, and
the erosion of community life. The minerals being handed over in this
agreement have already been at the center of a  war, one that
dispossesses people of land, health, and future. What is framed as
peace is in fact the continuation of imperial violence, where the
tools of war this time will be contracts and Western  corporations.
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In her book _Remaindered Life_
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writes that “we live in a time when every day brings ample evidence
of the disposability of human life. It is a casual use of the
word—human—for the very disposability of this life.”
Dispossession, in this context, is not only historical, it is ongoing.
“A war of dispossession,” Tadiar reminds us, “is the mode of
accumulation dominantly understood as the ‘original’ or
‘primitive’ basis of the rise of capital, even as those who
struggle to survive in this moment know intimately well that a racist,
sexist war of dispossession is the beating heart of
contemporary global capitalism
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The DRC, with the world’s largest reserves of cobalt
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diamonds, zinc, and uranium,  continues to be a site of imperial
hunger,
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the lives of the Congolese people are rendered expendable in service
of global supply chains and Western profit. More than 40,000 children
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adult mining workers continue to work in mines under toxic, inhumane
conditions. These children and the communities they are part of live
what Tadiar calls “remaindered lives”: lives marked as disposable,
wasteful, or necessary only insofar as they serve capital. Peace deals
in this global system are often nothing more than a pause in direct
confrontation so that the violence of extraction may continue
uninterrupted.

Tadiar writes that “waste is the object of the new imperialism,”
and in the Congo, both the land and its people have long been treated
as waste, exploited, paid below minimum wage, and left behind. The
mines that produce cobalt for phones
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cars
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surrounded by devastated ecosystems
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and impoverished communities. Trump’s so-called peace deal cements a
long-standing imperial relationship: the extraction of value from
African soil without regard for the people who live on it.

The assertion that this peace deal has finally culminated the
conflict  in the DRC distracts from the real terms of the deal: a
reinforcement of Western control over Congolese land and labor. Tadiar
reminds us that capitalism “sustains its dominance, often at the
cost of intensified inequality and environmental degradation.” In
the DRC, the cost is borne by children and communities who inhale dust
and dig for minerals to power devices and enrich Western economies. To
declare victory while announcing rights to minerals is to declare the
rights to the human lives in Congo. Mineral extraction cannot be
separated from the Congolese people, who labor under extreme
conditions to produce that wealth. Tadiar observes that “people
constantly make do to get by; it is they who have to fine-tune the art
of revaluing modernity’s waste into the arts of life making.” In
the DRC, mining has become survival. Entire communities rely on
artisanal mining not out of choice but out of necessity, forced to
convert waste—environmental, economic, and social—into survival.

Tadiar pushes us to see that “capital has for centuries profited
from the disposability of human and nonhuman lives.” Trump’s
announcement is not a rupture from this history; it is a continuation
of it. The DRC does not need peace deals that convert its minerals
into bargaining chips. It needs sovereignty, environmental justice,
and a world that stops treating African life as collateral damage in
the pursuit of global convenience.

To call this a successful peace deal and a final end to war is to
misname the ongoing violence in the DRC. The war over minerals in
Congo has never ceased; it has only taken different forms. Today, it
is waged not only through armed conflict but through the quiet
violence of environmental degradation, economic exploitation, and
peace deals that continue to prioritize imperial gain over human
lives.

_MARJORIE NAMARA RUGUNDA is a writer, researcher, and PhD student at
the University of British Columbia._

_AFRICA IS A COUNTRY offers a critical perspective on various social,
political, and cultural issues affecting Africa that push back on
continental legacies of colonialism and exploitation. Our editorial
viewpoint emphasizes the complexity and diversity of African
experiences, challenging stereotypes and simplistic narratives. Our
work highlights local voices and perspectives, focusing on
contemporary issues in politics, economics, and culture, as well as
the usable past. We often engage with broader global discourses while
remaining rooted in specific African contexts, advocating for nuanced
discussions that reflect the realities of life in Africa._

_Unless otherwise noted, all the content on Africa Is a Country is
published under a Creative Commons BY 4.0
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* Democratic Republic of Congo
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* Rwanda
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* war
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* neocolonialism
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* rare earth minerals
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* environment
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* Forced labor
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* capitalism
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