Eastern Congo’s ethnic Minorities

For decades, the Eastern Congo region, covering South Kivu, North Kivu, and Ituri provinces, has experienced persistent and widespread violence and armed conflicts. Within the complex violent setting, ethnic minorities, including the Banyamulenge, Congolese Tutsi, and Hema, and to some extent the Congolese Hutu, have been targeted as not “real Congolese”. They are perceived as non-native. While believed to be the first occupants of the land, the Batwa (Pygmies) are targeted because of their socio-economic status and for not being represented within the political sphere.

Ethnic minorities have been experiencing targeted violence that is intended to send them back to where they came from. Ethnic minorities have been attacked by armed local and foreign militias in many cases, supported by the Congolese army.

On top of that, ethnic minorities are highly targeted by hate speech and online campaigns that mobilise to get rid of them. While Eastern Congo conflicts have been extensively researched, there is yet scant research that documents the link between hatred campaigns and mass violence targeting these minority groups.

Hatred Monitoring Centre has set out the mission to fill this gap. We are a team of researchers, volunteers, and practitioners dedicated to documenting, tracking, assessing, and reporting the patterns of hatred campaigns (online and offline) and other forms of prejudice that target minorities. We also intend to shed light on how hatred campaigns inform and influence combatants to commit mass atrocities and genocidal violence. Hatred Monitoring Centre seeks to build hatred campaigns datasets to be used for academic purpose. At Hatred Monitoring Centre, our mission is to collect data from different social media platforms, analyse them, and suggest evidence-based measures and policies to tackle the danger associated with hate speech. Hatred Monitoring Centre will regularly produce reports and academic articles. We are aiming to engage decision-makers and policymakers to share our findings and insights learn from our work.

Ethnic minorities across the globe

Besides the Eastern DRC, HMC is aiming to learn from and cover other ethnic and linguistic minorities across the globe. They include Rohingyas, Yazidis, Hazaras, Romas, Uyghurs, Fulani…

Network of Researchers on discriminated minorities

Researchers on minorities have a lot to share and learn from one another. HMC will work towards establishing a research network comprising mainly scholars and researchers interested in researching minority discrimination and persecution. We believe that many achievements and initiatives start small and end up being impressive.