Great Lakes Refugee Crisis - Effects

Effects

The AFDL continued its offensive until it reached Kinshasa and overthrew the government in early 1997. Mobutu fled the country and soon died in exile. Laurent Kabila named himself the new president and changed the name of the country to "the Democratic Republic of the Congo". However, the relationship between Kabila and his Rwandan and Ugandan backers turned sour. An attempt by the two states to overthrow Kabila in late 1997 grew into the Second Congo War, the world's deadliest conflict since the Second World War. While peace was officially declared in 2002, ethnically inspired violence continues to afflict the Kivus.

Rwanda continues to struggle with the aftermath of genocide and large-scale forced migration. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and community gacaca courts exist to punish those who planned and carried out the genocide, but the scale of violence forced the Rwandan people into an occasionally uneasy coexistence. The Rwandan government has been generally credited with encouraging economic development and national reconciliation, though it has also been criticized for oppression of its critics.

The crisis had a massive impact on the ecology of the region. The forests of Virunga National Park, home to the endangered mountain gorilla, were badly damaged by the demands for firewood and charcoal made by the refugees. Two years after the arrival of the refugees 105 km2 of the park's forest had been affected, of which 63 km2 had been razed.

The outside world, at the time focused on the wars of the former Yugoslavia, turned its attention away from the happenings of central Africa. The exception was the international humanitarian aid community and the United Nations, for whom the Great Lakes crisis was an agonizing dilemma that has been the topic of extensive analysis and ethical arguments. As a result, UNHCR reworked its procedures to try to ensure greater international commitment in its interventions.