The Rwanda-backed M23 armed group has forcibly recruited thousands of people in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo and detained them in inhumane conditions, Human Rights Watch said Wednesday.
The anti-government group has seized vast swathes of territory since it re-emerged in 2021 in eastern DRC, which has been plagued by conflict for over 30 years.
Since taking the major cities of Goma and Bukavu, M23 "has carried out large-scale forced recruitment and other operations in areas under its control," the rights NGO said in a new report.
It has been "detaining thousands of Congolese soldiers and militia members, and increasingly civilians, subjecting them to inhumane and life-threatening treatment," said the report, which HRW said was "based on interviews with 102 former detainees and dozens of other sources."
Witnesses and former detainees described "people being abducted from the street or from their homes, rounded up at meetings, churches or schools and held in makeshift detention facilities, military camps or transferred to undisclosed locations."
