The Democratic Republic of Congo

The conflict

In 1997 the dictator Mobutu, after a ruinous reign of over thirty years, was deposed by opposition forces with backing from Rwanda, Uganda and Angola. Laurent Kabila was installed as President but there was no happy outcome. In the following year Kabila quarrelled with his Rwandan and Ugandan allies, and the result was a bloody conflict which has taken an estimated four million lives. By ordinary reckoning this is one of the worst disasters of recent history.

With the backing of Angola, Zimbabwe and to a lesser extent Namibia, Kabila maintained himself in Kinshasa and the north-west, but most of the east came under the control of Rwanda and Uganda. In the north-east there has been confusion bordering on total anarchy. At one point Ugandan and Rwandan soldiers fought one another, and both countries have patronised and armed local 'rebel' factions. Rwanda, Uganda and Angola had genuine security reasons for intervention, as the Congo conflicts spilled across their borders, but the underlying source of the war is the country's great wealth of natural resources. These have been unashamedly looted by Zimbabwe and Uganda - to the personal benefit of leading political and military figures - as well as by local warlords.

UK Hawks

The arms used in the conflict have come from a variety of sources but do not include significant contributions from the UK, with the exception of Hawk aircraft. In early 2000 the Zimbabwe government sought spares for its Hawks, which were playing a major role in its Congo campaign. Licences were approved in February of that year, but a few months later the UK announced an arms embargo. Of the seven licences granted, five were returned unused, but most of the goods covered by one licence and around 20% of another had been exported.

DSEi

Even though the foreign powers in the DRC were engaged in a disastrous war and were apparently not buyers of significant amounts of UK weaponry, several of them still received invitations to DSEi during the conflict. Angola, Namibia and Zimbabwe were all invited to the 1999 event and Uganda and Angola received invitations to DSEi 2001.