USIP Fact Sheets

For almost two decades, the illegal exploitation of natural resources has contributed significantly to the financing of violent conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Both armed groups and criminal networks within the Congolese army have financially benefited from the production and trade of minerals, timber, charcoal, and wildlife. The persistent political warfare supported—and in part driven—by this commerce has led to atrocities that include gender-based violence and recruitment of child soldiers. Efforts to address these sources of conflict financing, including United Nations sanctions against the armed groups and their networks as well as U.S. legislation regarding minerals from conflict zones, have not explored the potential of bringing criminal prosecutions under Congolese and interna-tional law. 

After more than 50 years, one of the world’s longest-running wars is close to being ended. Colombia’s government and rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC-EP) signed a peace accord in August following years of talks in Havana. Colombian voters narrowly rejected the accord amid a low referendum turnout in October, but both sides vowed to renew talks and avoid a return to bloodshed. The U.S., which invested about $10 billion in strengthening Colombian security forces to defeat the FARC and suppress its drug trafficking, has eagerly supported the peace process. But completing an agreement and making it a reality for 47 million Colombians poses a massive challenge of national reconciliation.

The first peaceful and democratic election in the Central African Republic (CAR) in February 2016 opened the way for accelerating efforts to stabilize a country beset by violence since gaining independence from France in 1960. A source of diamonds, gold, oil and uranium, CAR has been riven by regional power struggles among armed groups and across borders. A United Nations peacekeeping mission has more than 11,000 personnel in the country, and U.S. military forces are advising on the pursuit of the notorious Lord’s Resistance Army militant group.

The Peace Day Challenge is a global effort to turn the International Day of Peace into a day of global action that affirms peace as a real alternative to the increasing violence we see daily. It encourages people to build peace on September 21, and to inspire others to join in, using the social media tag #PeaceDayChallenge.

Scholars, peacebuilders and governments increasingly understand that gender is critical to analyzing violent conflicts and transforming them into sustainable peace. The public focus on gender issues in peacebuilding has been growing since 2000, when the U.N. Security Council adopted Resolution 1325. The measure urged countries to craft national action plans to protect women and girls during conflict and ensure women have a greater voice in decision-making on security issues.

Syria’s war is not only a humanitarian catastrophe but a threat to stability in countries as distant as Europe. The warfare has killed perhaps 400,000 people, according to U.N. envoy Staffan de Mistura, and uprooted as many as 12 million, half of the population. It is the main cause of the massive refugee flight to Europe. Critical roots of this violence, often overlooked in public discussion of the war, lie in a complex knot of local and sectarian conflicts that remained unresolved beneath Syria’s decades of authoritarian rule. In recent years, the violence has been amplified by the brutality of ISIS and other extremist groups, and by the military intervention of foreign forces.

After decades of civil war and the collapse of the central government in 1991, Somalis and international supporters have renewed efforts – and made progress – since 2012 in re-establishing state structures and bringing stability to the country. The African Union and the United Nations, with U.S. assistance, support the Federal Government of Somalia in restoring institutions. Improving security and countering al-Shabab, a violent extremist group, continue to be first-order priorities. At the same time, consensus must be reached about the composition, boundaries, and powers of Somalia’s constituent states. 

The country’s transition from military rule to representative democracy is complicated by entrenched political and economic interests, religious and ethnic cleavages, and difficult negotiations with an array of armed groups to settle decades-long internal conflicts. As peace talks drag on, the nation’s parliamentary election, slated to take place in late 2015, threatens to exacerbate tensions within and among groups. In addition, the constitution unfairly prohibits  the main opposition candidate, Nobel Peace Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, from standing for president. Myanmar also faces the imperative to address communal (particularly Buddhist/Muslim) violence intensified by narratives spread on social media and elsewhere that inflame prejudice and violence.

Iraq has been ravaged by cycles of warfare, a growing refugee crisis, crippling sectarianism, and the violent spread of the self-styled Islamic State extremist movement (also known as ISIS, ISIL or by its Arabic acronym, Daesh). While Iraqis have made some progress over the years in building their government—approving a constitution, and holding parliamentary and provincial elections—governing institutions remain weak, and corruption and poverty are endemic. The ISIS threat and rising violence compelled U.S. military advisors to return to the country in 2014, after having withdrawn in 2011. These conditions, linked with the conflict in Syria and others in the region, continue to erode global stability to the country in 2014, after having withdrawn in 2011. These conditions, linked with the conflict in Syri the conflict in Syria and others in the region, continue to erode global stability.

Violent extremist movements are at the center of a rising death toll from conflict worldwide, research shows. Just a handful of such movements—including ISIS, Boko Haram, the Taliban, and Al-Shabab—fuel the world’s most violent wars, concentrated in collapsed or fragile states in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. They use sophisticated tools of internet technology and social media to radicalize, recruit, and arm young people regionally and globally. The global urgency of countering this violence was reflected in the U.S. administration’s decision to convene the three-day White House Summit on Countering Violent Extremism in February 2015.