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This paper is number 4 of the briefing series Transforming Conservation: from conflict to justice.

In February 2023, Forest Peoples Programme submitted a response to a parliamentary inquiry into critical minerals launched by the UK Foreign Affairs Committee.  

This paper is number 2 of the briefing series Transforming Conservation: from conflict to justice. From Eastern Congo to the coast of Kenya, “security” crises are used to evict forest peoples, creating greater insecurity in the process. We compare this practice in relation to the Batwa in present day Kahuzi-Biega (DR Congo), the Ogiek in 1980s Mt Elgon (Kenya), the Benet Mosopisyek bopth at Mt Elgon in 2008 (Uganda), and the Aweer in Lamu County from 1963 to 1967 (Kenya).

For decades, Indigenous Peoples have been advocating for their rights, knowledge, and traditional sustainable practices to be recognized in international climate change negotiations and to be included in related international and national climate mitigation and adaptation plans and agreements.

The Asia Indigenous Peoples Pact (AIPP) partnered with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), through the UN-REDD Programme and the Forest Peoples Programme, on a study to shed light on how the rights, roles and knowledge of indigenous men, women, youth, and persons with disabilities are addressed in national-level climate policies and

Using militarised forces to evict people from their ancestral land to create ‘protected areas’ for conservation tramples on human rights and is never acceptable. It also goes against scientific evidence that demonstrates Indigenous peoples better protect biodiversity, and that the results are even greater where they have security of tenure and control over their traditionally owned territories.

From Eastern Congo to the coast of Kenya, “security” crises are used to evict forest people, creating greater insecurity in the process. We compare this practice in relation to the Batwa in present day Kahuzi-Biega (DR Congo), the Ogiek in 1980s Mt Elgon (Kenya), the Benet at Mt Elgon in 2008 (Uganda), and the Aweer in Lamu County from 1963 to 1967 (Kenya).

Over the weekend of 12th-14th November 2021, in Kahuzi-Biega National Park, at least two whole Batwa villages were burnt to the ground, a man was shot dead, two women were shot and injured and at least one woman who was pregnant is still unaccounted for and feared burnt alive in her house. Villagers fled into the forest to hide.

On Friday 30 July 2021, the Military Court of South Kivu rendered its verdict in the case between the Congolese Institute for Nature Conservation (ICCN) and the Public Prosecutor's Office and seven members of the Batwa indigenous community of Muyange in Kabare territory, ordering their release.  

Batwa communities around Kahuzi-Biega National Park were displaced in the 1970s by the creation of the Park and have lived in a situation of landlessness and precarity ever since.

MEDIA BRIEFING: FEBRUARY 18, 2021, 10:00-11:30 AM ET / 3:00 PM GMT

In the final days of 2020, 10 ecoguards in two national parks in the Democratic Republic of Congo were found guilty of serious crimes: murder, rape, torture and actual bodily harm. The crimes were perpetrated against indigenous Batwa people living just outside Kahuzi-Biega and Salonga National Parks.

A Congolese court in is on the point of awarding damages to the families of two indigenous Batwa men who were killed by Kahuzi Biega National Park (PNKB) ecoguards in 2019.

On 16 May 2020, super cyclone Amphan damaged communities’ crops, infrastructure and coastal protection embankments in 26 coastal districts, and destroyed many livelihood options. The pandemic and nationwide lockdown has also exacerbated the hardships that come with existing marginalisation of and discrimination against forest peoples. 

The management of Kahuzi-Biega National Park is becoming desperate in its attempts to discredit local Batwa leaders, and in doing so, is putting them and those that support them in danger.

We’re delighted to announce that as of 15 September, five Batwa men who had been detained in prison in Bukavu, Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, since August 2019 are all, at long last, back home with their families.

Since 4 February this year, eight Batwa people have been imprisoned in appalling conditions in eastern DRC. We are pleased to hear that two of them, Nsimire M’Manda and Faida Bahati, have been temporarily released on bail as of 30 July.

On 4 February 2020, eight indigenous Batwa men and women were sentenced to up to 15 years in prison after seeking to regain access to their traditional lands, now part of Kahuzi Biega National Park.

Forest Peoples Programme is no longer going to invest in efforts to facilitate dialogue between the management of Kahuzi-Biega National Park in South Kivu, Democratic Republic of Congo, and the Batwa communities living around the Park.

On 4 February, following an unfair trial lasting just one day, the Bukavu Garrison Military Court sentenced eight Batwa men and women to up to 15 years in prison, for seeking access to their traditional lands, now part of a national park.