Kagame, Tshisekedi in Washington as US brokers 'decisive' Congo peace deal
The accord draws an unusually broad cast. Qatar, guarantor of a preliminary ministerial deal, will be present. So too will Kenya's William Ruto in his capacity as EAC chair; Angola as AU chair; Burundi and Uganda, both entangled in the conflict; the African Union Commission; the UAE; and Togo, the AU's designated special envoy.
Rwanda's Paul Kagame and the Democratic Republic of Congo's Felix Tshisekedi have arrived in Washington, where the White House hopes to broker what it calls a "decisive" peace agreement after years of bloodshed in eastern Congo.
President Donald Trump is expected to preside over the signing later today—a symbolic attempt to stabilise one of Africa's most mineral-rich yet volatile regions.
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The accord draws an unusually broad cast. Qatar, guarantor of a preliminary ministerial deal, will be present. So too will Kenya's William Ruto in his capacity as EAC chair; Angola as AU chair; Burundi and Uganda, both entangled in the conflict; the African Union Commission; the UAE; and Togo, the AU's designated special envoy.
Regional facilitators, including Kenya's former president Uhuru Kenyatta and Nigeria's Olusegun Obasanjo, are also flying in.
President Kagame has arrived in Washington, D.C., where he will meet with President Donald Trump @realDonaldTrump and join the signing of the Washington Accord. pic.twitter.com/0P18KrIpLd
— Presidency | Rwanda (@UrugwiroVillage) December 3, 2025
Yet the spectacle displays an awkward truth for a continent fond of invoking "African solutions to African problems".
Rwanda's Kagame, one of the slogan's most persistent evangelists, now finds himself negotiating peace not in Addis Ababa or Nairobi, but under the chandeliers of the White House alongside Tshisekedi.
After years of failed regional efforts, the centre of gravity has shifted.
For Africa's progressives, the deal—if it holds—would mark a long overdue movement toward ending a conflict that has displaced millions and left the eastern Congo trapped in a paradox: fabulously wealthy on paper, yet desperately poor in lived reality.
Democratic Republic of Congo's Felix Tshisekedi have arrived in Washington. (DRC Presidency)
The AU's flagship "Silencing the Guns" agenda, originally targeting 2020, is now five years overdue and far from achieved.
In geopolitical terms, Washington's intervention amounts to a modus vivendi imposed from afar, a diplomatic workaround for two leaders who have exhausted regional mechanisms.
For continental purists, the optics will sting. For pragmatists, they matter little.
As Deng Xiaoping liked to say, it does not matter whether a cat is black or white—only whether it catches mice.
President William Ruto arrives in Washington DC at the invitation of US President Donald Trump to join President Paul Kagame and President Félix Tshisekedi to witness the official signing of the DRC-Rwanda Peace Agreement..
— State Department for Foreign Affairs | Kenya (@ForeignOfficeKE) December 3, 2025
During the visit, the President will also advance… pic.twitter.com/29lh4AEQyK
In the Great Lakes, peace is the only mouse worth catching.
Whether this Washington accord will endure, or simply join the graveyard of previous regional frameworks, will determine if the region's vast mineral wealth can finally translate into human security.
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