Congo’s military justice system has handed down one of its heaviest verdicts of the year. Late on the evening of Friday, November 6, 2026, the Goma garrison military court, sitting in a mobile hearing in Walikale-Centre, sentenced 66 soldiers of the 3415th regiment of the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo to death. Another soldier received ten years in prison, while four defendants were acquitted.
According to Major Dieudonné Kasereka, spokesman for the 34th military region, the accused faced charges of military revolt, refusal to obey orders, cowardice in the face of the enemy and squandering of war ammunition. The ruling came after twelve days of hearings, with the trial having opened on October 26 under expedited proceedings.
The case dates back to mid-October. Shooting broke out in Ntoto, in the Wanianga sector of Walikale territory, and incidents on October 16 and 20 left two soldiers and one civilian dead, according to local media. Arrests followed on October 20 in Ngora. The case initially involved 54 soldiers before being widened to 71 defendants.
The court did not fully follow the prosecution. Prosecutors had sought the death penalty for 70 of the 71 accused and ten years for a military intelligence officer. In the end, four soldiers were acquitted, including the captain in charge of the regiment’s intelligence. Those convicted can appeal to the High Military Court.
Where the trial took place says a great deal about the situation in the region. With Goma held by the AFC/M23 rebellion, along with large parts of North Kivu, the military court that bears the city’s name now sits elsewhere in the province.
This is not the first time the 3415th regiment has faced judges. On September 1, ten of its members were convicted over the death of Captain Musanga Bebeto, shot dead on October 30, 2025 in Lukole, Masisi territory: two were sentenced to death, three to ten years and five to ten months.
The Walikale verdict also fits a broader pattern. In October, 27 soldiers had already been sentenced to death for abandoning their positions against AFC/M23 rebels. Since 2025, more than 500 Congolese soldiers have been convicted by military courts, 381 of them sentenced to death. In February 2025, the Butembo garrison court handed down 55 death sentences for fleeing the enemy, a few days after 212 others were sentenced to death in Bukavu.
Military authorities present these trials as an essential tool for restoring order in the ranks. Yet the repeated mass convictions above all reveal the tensions running through an army that has spent years fighting a gruelling war, with troops that are sometimes poorly led and poorly equipped. The fate awaiting the condemned remains uncertain: Kinshasa lifted its moratorium on executions in 2024, but whether the death penalty has actually been carried out since then has not been clearly established.