Power shared and justice shelved: the Democratic Republic of Congo

The Global Accord (2002) ended the Congo War, contributed to the creation of the Third Republic and influenced subsequent peace agreements. This article (in the International Journal of Human Rights, 2013, Vol. 17, No. 2, 289–306) analyses how justice for human rights violations was included in the Global Accord and later peace deals. It assesses how the power-sharing aspects of these agreements affected the pursuit of accountability, and finds they undermined transitional justice efforts and contributed to continued abuse. It concludes that free-wheeling power-sharing within the security institutions is the biggest challenge to both accountability and peace: post-conflict security arrangements are therefore the crucial nexus between peacebuilding and accountability for human rights violations.

Keywords: power-sharing; transitional justice; Democratic Republic of Congo; security arrangements; peacebuilding; gender

The article is available here.