SPONSORING WAR AND FOOTBALL: ARSENAL FC URGED TO CUT RWANDA TIES OVER BLOODY DRC ROLE

SPONSORING WAR AND FOOTBALL:

ARSENAL FC URGED TO CUT RWANDA TIES OVER BLOODY DRC ROLE

Arsenal fans are urging the club to rethink its partnership with Visit Rwanda, calling on the board to "put financial gains aside."  According to the Gunners for Peace group, recent polls of Arsenal fans have shown that six in 10 support ending the collaboration deal.  Campaigners have also drawn attention to the fact that Arsenal fans in Congo and the UK are removing the Visit Rwanda part of their Arsenal shirts given such partnerships risk whitewashing the actions of Rwanda which is  implicated in the mayhem.

Rwanda's partnerships with Arsenal, Bayern Munich and Paris St Germain (PSG) have come under intense pressure, with growing calls for the football clubs to terminate their deals with Rwanda, which is accused of directly supporting the M23 rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo's foreign-backed resource-conflict.

In early February, Congo's foreign minister urged Arsenal, Bayern and PSG to end their "blood-stained" partnerships with Visit Rwanda after the M23 rebel group captured Goma, eastern Congo's largest city and home to gold, coltan and tin mines.  Thérèse Wagner wrote to the clubs, asking their presidents to question the morality of the deals funded by "blood minerals" illicitly extracted from Congo.  In the letter, she mentioned a UN report revealing that up to 4,000 Rwandan troops were in Congo.

Visit Rwanda began its partnership with Arsenal in 2018 in a deal reported to be worth more than £10 million.  Despite an online petition of 75,000 signatures calling for PSG to terminate its agreement with Rwanda, the club announced 16 April that it had renewed it - to run until 2028.

The ongoing resource conflict in the DRC has persisted for three decades, involving over 120 armed groups, some supported by foreign powers.  The toll has been devastating, with approximately 6-million Congolese lives lost, more than 7-million people displaced, and countless women and girls enduring the horrors of sexual violence.