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Spokespersons for Parliament and for the political groups will hold a briefing on the 19 – 22 October plenary session, on Friday at 11.00 in Parliament’s Anna Politkovskaya press room.

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

Spokespersons for Parliament and for the political groups will hold a briefing on the 19 – 22 October plenary session, on Friday at 11.00 in Parliament’s Anna Politkovskaya press room.

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

Impunity for past crimes has fueled decades of violence and human rights abuses in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Credit: MONUSCO/Aubin Mukoni

By Ida Sawyer
WASHINGTON DC, Oct 15 2026 (IPS)

It has been 30 years since Rwanda-backed rebel forces attacked Lemera hospital in what was then eastern Zaire, killing 37 patients and medical staff. This was one of the first major atrocities during what became known as the First Congo War, helping to unleash decades of foreign-backed rebellions and grave abuses against civilians by all sides, including ethnic-based massacres, widespread rape and sexual violence, forced recruitment of children, abductions, torture, mutilation, and forced displacement.

The Congolese Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Dr. Denis Mukwege, began his career as a doctor at Lemera hospital, and he was there on October 6, 1996 when the place he thought was safe, protected by international humanitarian law, became the scene of carnage. Dr. Mukwege has since dedicated his life to supporting survivors of sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo and to advocating justice for victims.

The attack on Lemera hospital was one of the 617 incidents in the United Nations Mapping Report, which documents alleged serious violations of international humanitarian and human rights law in Congo between 1993 and 2003.

What’s missing now is the political will to prioritize justice for the Congolese people. With millions killed during hostilities or dying from conflict-related causes, the war in Congo is widely regarded as the deadliest conflict for civilians since World War II
Yet the serious crimes went on. Despite the important work of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and Congolese military courts, the vast majority of alleged perpetrators remain unpunished, including high-level government and military officials from Congo, Rwanda, and Uganda.

Attacks as horrific as the one on Lemera hospital continue today, as an abusive Rwanda-backed armed group, known as the M23, controls large swathes of North and South Kivu provinces, while numerous other armed groups as well as Congolese army forces and their allies continue to target civilians.

Many of the commanders responsible for abuses that Human Rights Watch and others have documented in recent months are the same ones whose crimes we have documented for decades – often as they move from one armed group to another, integrate into the Congolese army, and then leave again when they have new grievances. Impunity for these past crimes has fueled the abuses we’re documenting today.

What’s missing now is the political will to prioritize justice for the Congolese people. With millions killed during hostilities or dying from conflict-related causes, the war in Congo is widely regarded as the deadliest conflict for civilians since World War II. Yet despite, or perhaps because of, its brutal and seemingly intractable nature, the conflict rarely dominates headlines or high-level diplomatic agendas.

When Congo does capture the world’s attention, it is more often for its natural resources than the plight of its citizens. Powerful foreign countries and companies – facilitated and enabled by self-serving national leaders – exploit and plunder the country’s wealth. Congo’s minerals help power the technological revolution driving so much of global economic growth, all while a litany of grave abuses go unpunished and undeterred.

To break this culture of violence and impunity, world leaders should put meaningful pressure on both the Congolese and Rwandan governments to end all support to abusive armed groups operating in Congo.

They should also press the Congolese government to implement a vetting program, with international support, to remove those implicated in serious human rights abuses from the Congolese security forces, intelligence services, and government positions.

And they should support a multi-tiered justice response to address the scale and gravity of Congo’s impunity gap. This should include support to the ICC and its ongoing investigation in Congo, the pursuit abroad of universal jurisdiction cases wherever possible, and continued support to improve Congo’s military justice system.

There also needs to be an internationalized justice mechanism to complement the work of the ICC and purely domestic courts, and a comprehensive reparations program for victims of serious international crimes.

I was honored to join Dr. Mukwege in Brussels and Strasbourg in recent days to initate a campaign, “30 Years of War, 30 Years of Impunity,” during events organized by the Panzi Foundation, the René Cassin Foundation, the city of Brussels, and the Eurometropolis of Strasbourg, to raise awareness about the conflict in Congo and to mobilize strong international action to end the cycles of violence, abuse, and impunity.

As Dr. Mukwege said in Strasbourg: “Thirty years of war is thirty years too many. Thirty years of impunity is thirty years too many. … . It is time to place the right of millions of victims to justice at the heart of efforts to establish peace and consolidate the rule of law.”

Ida Sawyer is crisis, conflict, and arms director at Human Rights Watch.

Newsletter - 19-22 October 2026 - Strasbourg plenary session

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

Press briefing ahead of the Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Council (Employment and social policy) will take place on 16 October at 17:00. The briefing will be "off the record".

The second Summit between the European Union and the Gulf Cooperation Council, originally planned for 24 October 2026 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, has been postponed. A new date will be announced in due course.

In their second review of the joint declaration and roadmap, designed to boost economic growth, the EU institutions reaffirmed their commitment to timely delivery.

At the European Council, President Metsola called for a long-term EU budget that matches Europe's ambitions, faster progress on competitiveness, and continued momentum for enlargement.

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

At the European Council, President Metsola called for a long-term EU budget that matches Europe's ambitions, faster progress on competitiveness, and continued momentum for enlargement.

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

At the European Council, President Metsola called for a long-term EU budget that matches Europe's ambitions, faster progress on competitiveness, and continued momentum for enlargement.

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

At the European Council, President Metsola called for a long-term EU budget that matches Europe's ambitions, faster progress on competitiveness, and continued momentum for enlargement.

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

A senior South African cricket official pledges to order a review into the low crowd which attended the first Test against Australia in Durban.

Following the publication of the long-awaited pre-enlargement policy reviews by the European Commission and just in time for the October Council Summit, Dr. Frauke Seebass (Research Fellow, Wider Europe Programme – ELIAMEP & think nea – New Narratives of EU Integration) and Ioannis Alexandris (Research Fellow, Wider Europe Programme – ELIAMEP & think nea – New Narratives of EU Integration) co-authored the policy brief “Preparing the EU for Enlargement Means Investing in Strategic Autonomy. And integrating the Western Balkans is key” in the framework of ELIAMEP’s initiative think nea – New Narratives of EU Integration which is supported by OSF-WB. 

Originally hailed as a possible “Helsinki Moment” for enlargement, this week’s Council Summit is unlikely to focus much on the issue. Work will continue in the Council and capitals in the coming months based on the long-awaited pre-enlargement policy reviews presented by the EU Commission on 6 October 2026 acknowledge the inherent connection between a bigger and a stronger Union. It will not be up to the Council to translate into practice suggestions for closer integration before accession and to prepare the EU itself.

European strategic autonomy risks remaining a buzzword if European leaders fail to understand it as a continent-wide strategic vision and not merely another EU-level policy and the Western Balkans as a key asset to include in their deliberations beyond the accession process. Locking the region into the EU is neither luxury nor charity – it is essential to the Union’s geopolitical actorness.

As can be seen in the current practice, candidates – with the possible exception of Ukraine in EU deliberations on common defence – are included in new initiatives most often as an afterthought rather than seeing their inclusion as a (geo-)strategic imperative. This is true for the Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA), the Security Action for Europe (SAFE) instrument, as well as for the Democracy Shield. In the meantime, geopolitical competitors and adversaries are securing mining and defence contracts in countries like Serbia, Bosnia- Herzegovina, and North Macedonia while deepening strategic dependencies contrary to EU interests. This is a geopolitical lose-lose situation for the EU as it continues to miss opportunities to strengthen its strategic autonomy while its competitors increase their footprint on the continent. The more these trends persist and the longer Western Balkan countries remain outside the EU’s vision and policy debates, the more entrenched strategic dependencies will become and more difficult to reverse course. Evidently, anticipating enlargement strategically requires consultations beyond the EU to accomplish its purpose of European strategic autonomy.

You can read the policy brief here.

His family has appealed to fans to remember his wife, children and family in prayer during this period of mourning.

AMENDMENTS 20 - 255 - Draft opinion EU Gender Action Plan IV – priorities for gender equality and women’s rights in external action
Committee on Foreign Affairs
Hannah Neumann

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

Le meurtrier de Colleen Slemmer a finalement été transporté à l'hôpital après que deux doses d'injection létale n'aient pas suffi à la tuer.

Kenia Inés Hernández Montalván. Credit: @CDHVitoria

By Clare Quirk
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa, Oct 15 2026 (IPS)

Kenia Hernández is an Indigenous Mexican lawyer and human rights defender dedicated to advancing women’s rights and social justice.

Arrested in October 2020, she has faced multiple criminal proceedings that human rights organisations, including CIVICUS, have denounced as politically motivated and linked to the criminalisation of her activism. This piece is the second in our series on the campaign that advocates for the immediate release of unjustly imprisoned or persecuted human rights defenders globally.



 

Additional reference: Five years of resistance: The case of Kenia Hernández and the battle against the fabrication of crimes 

Additional research and reporting: Cecilia Russell
Note: This feature is published with the support of CIVICUS: Stand As My Witness Campaign.
IPS is solely responsible for the editorial content, and it does not necessarily reflect the views of CIVICUS.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

 

 

 

The US will elect a new House of Representatives and a third of the members of the Senate in its midterm elections on 3 November. For President Donald Trump a lot is at stake: if the Republicans lose their majority in Congress it will be far more difficult for him to pursue his policies. Europe's press discusses the ramifications of the midterms for the US, Ukraine and Europe.