The area known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo was populated as early as 10,000 years ago and settled in the 7th and 8th centuries A.D. by Bantus from present-day Nigeria. Discovered in 1482 by Portuguese navigator Diego Cao and later explored by English journalist Henry Morton Stanley, the area was officially colonized in 1885 as a personal possession of Belgian King Leopold II as the Congo Free State. In 1907, administration shifted to the Belgian Government, which renamed the country the Belgian Congo. Following a series of riots and unrest, the Belgian Congo was granted its independence on June 30, 1960. Parliamentary elections in 1960 produced Patrice Lumumba as prime minister and Joseph Kasavubu as president of the renamed Democratic Republic of the Congo. 

Within the first year of independence, several events destabilized the country: the army mutinied; the governor of Katanga province attempted secession; a UN peacekeeping force was called in to restore order; Prime Minister Lumumba died under mysterious circumstances; and Col. Joseph Désiré Mobutu (later Mobutu Sese Seko) took over the government and ceded it again to President Kasavubu. 

Unrest and rebellion plagued the government until 1965, when Lieutenant General Mobutu, by then commander in chief of the national army, again seized control of the country and declared himself president for 5 years. Mobutu quickly centralized power into his own hands and was elected unopposed as president in 1970. Embarking on a campaign of cultural awareness, Mobutu renamed the country the Republic of Zaire and required citizens to adopt African names. Relative peace and stability prevailed until 1977 and 1978 when Katangan rebels, staged in Angola, launched a series of invasions into the Katanga region. The rebels were driven out with the aid of Belgian paratroopers. 

During the 1980s, Mobutu continued to enforce his one-party system of rule. Although Mobutu successfully maintained control during this period, opposition parties, most notably the Union pour la Democratie et le Progres Social (UDPS), were active. Mobutu\'s attempts to quell these groups drew significant international criticism. 

As the Cold War came to a close, internal and external pressures on Mobutu increased. In late 1989 and early 1990, Mobutu was weakened by a series of domestic protests, by heightened international criticism of his regime\'s human rights practices, and by a faltering economy. In April 1990 Mobutu agreed to the principle of a multi-party system with elections and a constitution. As details of a reform package were delayed, soldiers in September 1991 began looting Kinshasa to protest their unpaid wages. Two thousand French and Belgian troops, some of whom were flown in on U.S. Air Force planes, arrived to evacuate the 20,000 endangered foreign nationals in Kinshasa. 

In 1992, after previous similar attempts, the long-promised Sovereign National Conference was staged, encompassing more than 2,000 representatives from various political parties. The conference gave itself a legislative mandate and elected Archbishop Laurent Monsengwo as its chairman, along with Etienne Tshisekedi, leader of the UDPS, as prime minister. By the end of the year Mobutu had created a rival government with its own prime minister. The ensuing stalemate produced a compromise merger of the two governments into the High Council of Republic-Parliament of Transition (HCR-PT) in 1994, with Mobutu as head of state and Kengo Wa Dondo as prime minister. Although presidential and legislative elections were scheduled repeatedly over the next 2 years, they never took place. 

By 1996, the war and genocide in neighboring Rwanda had spilled over to Zaire. Rwandan Hutu militia forces (Interahamwe), who fled Rwanda following the ascension of a Tutsi-led government, were using Hutu refugees’ camps in eastern Zaire as bases for incursions against Rwanda. 

In October 1996, Rwandan troops (RPA) entered Zaire, simultaneously with the formation of an armed coalition led by Laurent-Desire Kabila known as the Alliance des Forces Democratiques pour la Liberation du Congo-Zaire (AFDL). With the goal of forcibly ousting Mobutu, the AFDL, supported by Rwanda and Uganda, began a military campaign towards Kinshasa. Following failed peace talks between Mobutu and Kabila in May 1997, Mobutu left the country, and Kabila marched into Kinshasa on May 17, 1997. Kabila declared himself president, consolidated power around himself and the AFDL, and renamed the country the Democratic Republic of Congo (D.R.C.). Kabila’s Army Chief and the Secretary General of the AFDL were Rwandan, and RPA units continued to operate tangentially with the D.R.C.’s military, which was renamed the Forces Armees Congolaises (FAC). 

Over the next year, relations between Kabila and his foreign backers deteriorated. In July 1998, Kabila ordered all foreign troops to leave the D.R.C. Most refused to leave. On August 2, fighting erupted throughout the D.R.C. as Rwandan troops in the D.R.C. “mutinied,” and fresh Rwandan and Ugandan troops entered the D.R.C. Two days later, Rwandan troops flew to Bas-Congo, with the intention of marching on Kinshasa, ousting Laurent Kabila, and replacing him with the newly formed Rwandan-backed rebel group called the Rassemblement Congolais pour la Democratie (RCD). The Rwandese campaign was thwarted at the last minute when Angolan, Zimbabwean, and Namibian troops intervened on behalf of the D.R.C. Government. The Rwandese and the RCD withdrew to eastern D.R.C., where they established de facto control over portions of eastern D.R.C. and continued to fight the Congolese Army and its foreign allies. 

In February 1999, Uganda backed the formation of a rebel group called the Mouvement pour la Liberation du Congo (MLC), which drew support from among ex-Mobutuists and ex-FAZ soldiers in Equateur province (Mobutu’s home province). Together, Uganda and the MLC established control over the northern third of the D.R.C. 

At this stage, the D.R.C. was divided de facto into three segments, and the parties controlling each segment had reached military deadlock. In July 1999, a cease-fire was proposed in Lusaka, Zambia, which all parties signed by the end of August. The Lusaka Accord called for a cease-fire, the deployment of a UN peacekeeping operation, MONUC, the withdrawal of foreign troops, and the launching of an “Inter-Congolese Dialogue” to form a transitional government leading to elections. The parties to the Lusaka Accord failed to fully implement its provisions in 1999 and 2000. Laurent Kabila drew increasing international criticism for blocking full deployment of UN troops, hindering progress toward an Inter-Congolese Dialogue, and suppressing internal political activity. 

On January 16, 2001, Laurent Kabila was assassinated and succeeded by his son, Joseph Kabila. Joseph Kabila reversed many of his father’s negative policies; over the next year, MONUC deployed throughout the country, and the Inter-Congolese Dialogue proceeded. By the end of 2002, all Angolan, Namibian, and Zimbabwean troops had withdrawn from the D.R.C. Following D.R.C.-Rwanda talks in South Africa that culminated in the Pretoria Accord in July 2002, Rwandan troops officially withdrew from the D.R.C. in October 2002, although there were continued, unconfirmed reports that Rwandan soldiers and military advisers remained integrated with RCD/G forces in eastern D.R.C. Ugandan troops officially withdrew from the D.R.C. in May 2003. 

In October 2001, the Inter-Congolese Dialogue began in Addis Ababa under the auspices of Facilitator Ketumile Masire (former president of Botswana). The initial meetings made little progress and were adjourned. On February 25, 2002, the dialogue was reconvened in South Africa. It included representatives from the government, rebel groups, political opposition, civil society, and Mai-Mai (Congolese local defense militias). The talks ended inconclusively on April 19, 2002, when the government and the MLC brokered an agreement that was signed by the majority of delegates at the dialogue but left out the RCD/G and opposition UDPS party, among others. 

This partial agreement was never implemented, and negotiations resumed in South Africa in October 2002. This time, the talks led to an all-inclusive power sharing agreement, which was signed by delegates in Pretoria on December 17, 2002, and formally ratified by all parties on April 2, 2003. Following nominations by each of the various signatory groups, President Kabila on June 30, 2003 issued a decree that formally announced the transitional government lineup. The four vice presidents took the oath of office on July 17, 2003, and most incoming ministers assumed their new functions within days thereafter. This transitional government is slated to last until elections--the first since 1960--are to be held in 2005 or 2006. 

Economy

The Congo\'s mineral wealth is the mainstay of the economy, but the development of the mining industry has occurred at the expense of commercial agriculture. The economy\'s growth spurted under Belgian control in the 1950s, slowed considerably during the country\'s post independence troubles in the early 1960s, accelerated again in the late 1960s when political stability returned, and has generally declined since the 1970s, when the nationalization of major industries resulted in a reduction of private investment. Since the early 1990s much of the economy has been in a state of collapse.

Although only 3% of the nation\'s land area is arable, a substantial part of the labor force is engaged as subsistence farmers. The principal food crops are cassava, yams, corn, rice, peanuts, plantains, and pulses. Rubber, coffee, cotton, tea, sugarcane, and palm products are produced commercially, primarily for export. Although agricultural production satisfied domestic demands before independence, Congo has become dependent on food imports. 

Mining is centered in Katanga province. Products include: copper, cobalt, zinc, manganese, uranium, cassiterite (tin ore), coal, gold, and silver. Diamonds are mined in Kasai. There are major deposits of petroleum offshore near the mouth of the Congo River. About 75% of the Congo is covered with forest containing ebony and teak as well as less valuable woods.

Kinshasa and Lubumbashi are the country\'s most important industrial centers. Manufacturing includes processed copper, zinc, and cassiterite; refined petroleum; basic consumer goods such as processed food, beverages, clothing, and footwear; and cement. The numerous rivers of the Congo give it an immense potential for producing hydroelectricity, a small but significant percentage of which has been realized.

Rivers form the backbone of the country\'s transportation network; unnavigable parts of the Congo (e.g., Kinshasa-Matadi and Kisangani-Ubundi) are bridged by rail lines, but the rail and road network in the Congo is in disrepair was a result of the civil war. Matadi, Boma, and Banana can handle oceangoing vessels. The E Congo is linked (via Lake Tanganyika) by rail with the seaport of Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania.

The country\'s export earnings come almost entirely from sales of primary products, which are vulnerable to sudden changes in world prices. Since 1994 diamonds have become the country\'s leading export following a decline in the production of copper (once the leading mineral product in terms of value). The country produces much of the world\'s small industrial diamonds. Petroleum also accounts for a substantial portion of export earnings. Other important exports are cobalt, coffee, palm products, and rubber. The leading imports are consumer goods, machinery, transport equipment, and foodstuffs. The country\'s principal trade partners are Belgium, the United States, France, Germany, and South Africa. The Congo is a member of the Southern African Development Community.

Below is an analysis of Democratic Republic of Congo according to The 2005 Index of Economic Freedom, The Heritage Foundation Heritage and The Wall Street Journal. 

Rank: Suspended

Score: n/a

Category: n/a

Population: 51, 580, 000

Total area: 2, 345, 410 sq. km

GDP: $4.65 billion

GDP growth rate: -3.0 %

GDP per capita: $90

Major exports: diamonds, crude oil, copper

Exports of goods and services: $2.8 billion

Major export trading partners: Belgium 64.2%, US 13.4%, Zimbabwe 6.6%, Finland 4.9%

Major imports: fuels, machinery and mining equipment, foodstuffs

Imports of goods and services (fob): $4.6 billion

Major import trading partners: South Africa 16.2%, Belgium 14.4%, Nigeria 10.2%, France 9.3%

Foreign direct investment (net): n/a

REFERENCES

www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0198161.html

www.answers.com/topic/congo-country-zaire

www.historyofnations.net/africa/drcongo.html www.factmonster.com/ce6/world/A0857522.html