Democratic Republic of the Congo
The Democratic Republic of the Congo, also known as the DR Congo, Congo-Kinshasa, or simply the Congo, or less often Zaire, is a country in Central Africa. By land area, it is the second-largest country in Africa and the 11th-largest in the world. With a population of around 112 million, the DR Congo is the fourth-most populous in Africa and most populous Francophone country in the world. French is the official and most widely spoken language, though there are over 200 indigenous languages. The capital and largest city is Kinshasa, which is also the economic center. The country is bordered by the Republic of the Congo, the Cabinda exclave of Angola, and the South Atlantic Ocean to the west; the Central African Republic and South Sudan to the north; Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, and Tanzania to the east; and Zambia and Angola to the south. Centered on the Congo Basin, most of the country's terrain is covered by dense rainforests and is crossed by many rivers, while the east and southeast are mountainous.
The territory of the Congo was first inhabited by Central African foragers around 90,000 years ago and was settled in the Bantu expansion about 2,000 to 3,000 years ago. In the west, the Kingdom of Kongo ruled around the mouth of the Congo River from the 14th to the 19th century. In the center and east, the empires of Mwene Muji, Luba, and Lunda ruled between the 15th and 19th centuries. These kingdoms were broken up by Europeans during the colonization of the Congo Basin. King Leopold II of Belgium acquired rights to the Congo territory in 1885 and called it the Congo Free State. In 1908, Leopold ceded the territory after international pressure in response to widespread atrocities, and it became a Belgian colony. Congo achieved independence from Belgium in 1960 and was immediately confronted by secessionist movements, the assassination of Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba, and the seizure of power by Mobutu Sese Seko in 1965. Mobutu renamed the country Zaire in 1971 and imposed a personalist dictatorship.
Instability caused by the influx of refugees from the Rwandan Civil War into the east of the country led to the First Congo War between 1996 and 1997, ending in Mobutu's overthrow. Its name was changed back to the DRC and it was confronted by the Second Congo War from 1998 to 2003, which resulted in the deaths of 5.4 million people and the assassination of President Laurent-Désiré Kabila. The war, described as the deadliest conflict since World War II, ended under President Joseph Kabila, who restored relative stability, though fighting continued in the east. Human rights remained poor, and there were frequent abuses, such as forced disappearances, torture, arbitrary imprisonment and restrictions on civil liberties. Kabila stepped down in 2019, the country's first peaceful transition of power since independence, after Félix Tshisekedi won the contentious 2018 general election. Since the early 2000s, there have been over 100 armed groups active in the DRC, concentrated in the Kivu region. One of its largest cities, Goma, was occupied by the March 23 Movement rebels in 2012 and 2025. The M23 uprising escalated in early 2025 after the capture of cities in the east, with military support from Rwanda, which has caused a conflict between the two countries. A peace agreement brokered by the US was signed by Rwanda and the DRC in June 2025.
Despite being incredibly rich in natural resources, the DRC is one of the world's poorest countries, having suffered from political instability, lack of infrastructure, rampant corruption, centuries of commercial and colonial extraction and exploitation, with little widespread development. The nation is a prominent example of the "resource curse". Besides Kinshasa, the next largest cities, Lubumbashi and Mbuji-Mayi, are mining communities. The largest exports are raw minerals and metal, which accounted for 80% of exports in 2023, with China being its largest trade partner. For 2023, DR Congo's level of human development was ranked 171 out of 193 countries by the Human Development Index. It is classified one of the least developed countries by the UN., following two decades of [|civil wars] and [|internal conflicts], around one million Congolese refugees were still living in neighbouring countries. Two million children are at risk of starvation, and the fighting has displaced 7 million people. The country is a member of the UN, Non-Aligned Movement, African Union, COMESA, Southern African Development Community, Organisation internationale de la Francophonie, and Economic Community of Central African States.
Etymology
The Democratic Republic of the Congo is named after the Congo River, which flows through the country. The Congo River is the world's deepest river and the world's third-largest river by discharge. The Comité d'études du haut Congo, established by King Leopold II of Belgium in 1876, and the International Association of the Congo, established by him in 1879, were also named after the river.The Congo River was named by early European sailors after the Kingdom of Kongo and its Bantu inhabitants, the Kongo people, when they encountered them in the 16th century. The word Kongo comes from the Kongo language. According to American writer Samuel Henry Nelson: "It is probable that the word 'Kongo' itself implies a public gathering and that it is based on the root konga, 'to gather'." The modern name of the Kongo people, Bakongo, was introduced in the early 20th century.
the Democratic Republic of the Congo has been known in the past as, in chronological order, the Congo Free State, Belgian Congo, the Republic of the Congo-Léopoldville, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Republic of Zaire, before returning to its current name the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
At the time of independence, the country was named the Republic of the Congo-Léopoldville to distinguish it from its neighbour Congo, officially the Republic of the Congo. With the promulgation of the Luluabourg Constitution on 1 August 1964, the country became the DRC but was renamed Zaire on 27 October 1971 by President Mobutu Sese Seko as part of his Authenticité initiative.
The word Zaire is from a Portuguese adaptation of a Kikongo word nzadi, a truncation of nzadi o nzere. The river was known as Zaire during the 16th and 17th centuries. Congo seems to have replaced Zaire gradually in English usage during the 18th century, and Congo is the preferred English name in 19th-century literature, although references to Zaire as the name used by the natives remained common.
In 1992, the Sovereign National Conference voted to change the name of the country to the "Democratic Republic of the Congo", but the change was not made. The country's name was later restored by President Laurent-Désiré Kabila when he overthrew Mobutu in 1997. To distinguish it from the neighboring Republic of the Congo, it is sometimes referred to as Congo , Congo-Kinshasa, or Big Congo. Its name is sometimes also abbreviated as Congo DR, DR Congo, DRC, the DROC, and RDC.
History
Early history
The area of the present day Democratic Republic of the Congo was inhabited as early as 90,000 years ago, and later underwent major demographic and technological change with the expansion of Bantu peoples during the first millennium BC. From this process emerged organised states and empires, including early confederations around Pool Malebo and later the Kingdom of Kongo, as well as the Luba and Lunda Empires.Congo Free State (1877–1908)
From the 1870s to 1908, King Leopold II of Belgium established and ruled the Congo Free State as his personal possession, using forced labour and concessionary companies to extract rubber, while violence, disease and exploitation caused catastrophic population loss. International exposure of the abuses, notably through the 1904 Casement Report and growing diplomatic pressure, led to Leopold's loss of control and the annexation of the territory as the Belgian Congo in 1908.Belgian Congo (1908–1960)
The Belgian Congo was governed directly from Brussels, and although this change in administration ended the most extreme abuses of the Congo Free State, Belgian rule largely continued earlier patterns of direct control, racial segregation, forced labour, and repression, while prioritising economic exploitation through close cooperation between the state, missionaries, and private companies. After the Second World War, urbanisation, development programmes, and limited social improvements fostered a small African middle class, but political exclusion persisted, contributing to the rise of nationalist movements and escalating demands for independence in the late 1950s.Independence and political crisis (1960–1965)
In May 1960, a growing nationalist movement, the Mouvement National Congolais led by Patrice Lumumba, won the parliamentary elections. Lumumba became the first Prime Minister of the Republic of the Congo, on 24 June 1960. The parliament elected Joseph Kasa-Vubu as president of the Alliance des Bakongo party. Other parties that emerged included the Parti Solidaire Africain led by Antoine Gizenga, and the Parti National du Peuple led by Albert Delvaux and Laurent Mbariko.The Belgian Congo achieved independence on 30 June 1960 under the name "République du Congo". Shortly after, on 15 August 1960, the neighboring French colony of Middle Congo also gained independence and adopted the same name, 'Republic of the Congo.' To avoid confusion between the two, the former Belgian Congo became known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo, while the former French colony retained the name 'Republic of the Congo'.
Shortly after independence the Force Publique mutinied, and on 11 July the province of Katanga and South Kasai engaged in secessionist struggles against the new leadership. Most of the 100,000 Europeans who had remained behind after independence fled the country. After the United Nations rejected Lumumba's call for help to put down the secessionist movements, Lumumba asked for assistance from the Soviet Union, who accepted and sent military supplies and advisers. On 23 August, the Congolese armed forces invaded South Kasai. Lumumba was dismissed from office on 5 September 1960 by Kasa-Vubu who publicly blamed him for massacres by the armed forces in South Kasai and for involving Soviets in the country. On 7 September, Lumumba made a speech to the Congolese House of Representatives, arguing his dismissal was illegal under the nation's laws. Congolese law gave parliament, not the president, the authority to dismiss a government minister. The House and Senate both rejected the dismissal of Lumumba, but the removal proceeded unconstitutionally.
On 14 September, Colonel Joseph Mobutu, with the backing of the US and Belgium, removed Lumumba from office. On 17 January 1961, Lumumba was handed over to Katangan authorities and executed by Belgian-led Katangan troops. A 2001 investigation by Belgium's Parliament found Belgium "morally responsible" for the murder of Lumumba, and the country has since officially apologised for its role in his death.
On 18 September 1961, in ongoing negotiations of a ceasefire, a plane crash near Ndola resulted in the death of Dag Hammarskjöld, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, along with all 15 passengers, setting off a succession crisis. Amidst widespread confusion and chaos, a temporary government was led by technicians. Katangan secession ended in January 1963 with the assistance of UN forces. Several short-lived governments of Joseph Ileo, Cyrille Adoula, and Moise Kapenda Tshombe took over in quick succession.
Meanwhile, in the east of the country, Soviet and Cuban-backed rebels called the Simbas rose up, taking a significant amount of territory and proclaiming a communist "People's Republic of the Congo" in Stanleyville. The Simbas were pushed out of Stanleyville in November 1964 during Operation Dragon Rouge, a military operation conducted by Belgian and American forces to rescue hundreds of hostages. Congolese government forces fully defeated the Simba rebels by November 1965.
Lumumba had previously appointed Mobutu chief of staff of the new Congo army, Armée Nationale Congolaise. Taking advantage of the leadership crisis between Kasavubu and Tshombe, Mobutu garnered enough support within the army to launch a coup. A constitutional referendum the year before Mobutu's coup of 1965 resulted in the country's official name being changed to the "Democratic Republic of the Congo". In 1971 Mobutu changed the name again, this time to "Republic of Zaire".