Virunga National Park

Lore & Background

Virunga National Park was established in April 1925 as Albert National Park, the Congo's first national park, conceived as a science-oriented nature reserve with the aim of studying and preserving wildlife and so-called 'primitive' hunter-gatherer African Pygmies. In 1926, Jean-Marie Derscheid headed the first Belgian mission to map the park, which encompassed an area of 500 km² around the extinct volcanoes Mount Karisimbi and Mount Mikeno. The protected area was extended in 1929 by Virunga National Park, which encompassed the Virunga Mountains, parts of the Rutshuru Territory, and the plains south of Lake Edward. Indigenous people lost their traditional land rights in this process, and were evicted from the protected area. Between the late 1930s and 1955, an estimated 85,000 Rwandophone people were moved to nearby Masisi in North Kivu. In 1969, the two parks were merged under the name Virunga National Park. In 1979, it was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Reader's Guide

Virunga National Park is significant for its rich diversity of habitats, exceptional biodiversity, and endemism, including the eastern gorilla and golden monkey. It has faced severe challenges since the 1990s, including civil war, refugee influx, deforestation, and armed rebel groups. Park rangers have been killed, and the park has been militarized to deter poachers and rebels, a tactic criticized as 'militarization of conservation.' Oil exploration has been a recurring threat: in 2011, the British company Soco International was granted a concession for extracting crude oil in the surroundings of and in large parts of the national park. Following international protests, the company stopped exploring activities and consented to refrain from starting similar operations in the vicinity of World Heritage sites. In 2021, an agreement between DRC's president Felix Tshisekedi and Boris Johnson at the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Glasgow aimed to prevent drilling, yet the government undermined that very protection by auctioning oil exploration blocks inside the park by the end of July 2022. The park's management has been subsidised by the European Commission since 2010, and park staff have helped combat regional outbreaks of Ebola in 2018 and 2026.

Did You Know?

• Two active volcanoes, Mount Nyiragongo and Nyamuragira, are located in the park.
• More than 3,000 faunal and floral species have been recorded, of which more than 300 are endemic to the Albertine Rift.
• In 1994, up to 40,000 people entered the park daily in search of firewood and food, deforesting huge areas.
• Between 1996 and 2003, 80 park staff were killed.
• In 2014, the park's chief warden, Emmanuel de Mérode, was assailed.

A Volcanic Landscape of Extraordinary Life

Nestled in the Albertine Rift Valley of eastern Congo, Virunga National Park stretches roughly 300 kilometres from the Puemba River in the north to Tchegera Island in Lake Kivu at its southern edge, running largely along the borders with Uganda and Rwanda. The terrain is dramatic: elevations climb from 680 metres in the Semliki River valley to a staggering 5,109 metres in the Rwenzori Mountains, all within a single 7,800-square-kilometre expanse. Two still-active volcanoes, Mount Nyiragongo and Nyamuragira, have sculpted the park's varied ecosystems over millennia. The result is a biodiversity hotspot where more than 3,000 animal and plant species have been documented. Over 300 of these are found nowhere else on Earth, restricted to the Albertine Rift corridor. Among them are the eastern gorilla and the golden monkey, both symbols of the region's irreplaceable ecological wealth.

A Colonial Inheritance and Its Human Cost

The park's origins trace to the early 1920s, when European conservation advocates such as Victor van Straelen, Jean Massart, and Jean-Marie Derscheid pushed for a protected zone in the northeastern Belgian Congo. In April 1925, Albert National Park was formally created as the colony's first national park, framed as a scientific reserve dedicated to studying wildlife and, in the language of the era, preserving so-called primitive Pygmy hunter-gatherers. Derscheid led the first Belgian surveying expedition in 1926, mapping the area around the extinct peaks of Karisimbi and Mikeno. By 1929 the boundaries expanded to incorporate the Virunga volcanic range, portions of Rutshuru Territory, and the plains south of Lake Edward, starting at roughly 2,921 square kilometres and growing incrementally thereafter. The human toll was severe: indigenous communities forfeited ancestral land rights and were forcibly relocated. Between the late 1930s and 1955, an estimated 85,000 Rwandophone residents were displaced to the Masisi area of North Kivu. In 1969 the two predecessor parks were merged under the single name Virunga.

War, Refugees, and the Price of Protection

From the early 1990s onward, the park became a casualty of the broader Great Lakes crisis. In the wake of the 1994 Rwandan genocide, roughly 850,000 refugees gathered in the Kivu region surrounding Virunga, and armed forces proliferated. The First and Second Congo Wars compounded the instability, obstructing anti-poaching patrols and exposing both rangers and wildlife to lethal violence. At the height of the refugee influx, as many as 40,000 people entered the park each day seeking firewood and food, stripping vast tracts of forest. Rebel factions carried out repeated deadly attacks, and park rangers were killed in the line of duty. UNESCO responded in 1994 by placing Virunga on the List of World Heritage in Danger. The park nonetheless retained its 1996 Ramsar designation for wetland importance. Decades later, in 2018 and again in 2026, park staff were redeployed to assist in containing Ebola outbreaks, with the central government in 2026 calling on rangers to establish screening and isolation posts to halt the virus's southward spread into North Kivu.

The Oil Question and the Fight for Sovereignty

The spectre of petroleum extraction has haunted Virunga since the 2000s, when plans to drill in the Congo Basin first emerged. In 2011 the British firm Soco International received a concession covering large parts of the park and its surroundings; park management openly opposed the move while government officials backed Soco's field teams. Tensions escalated to the point where chief warden Emmanuel de Mérode was physically assaulted in April 2014. Sustained international protest eventually compelled Soco to halt operations and pledge to stay clear of World Heritage zones. A similar flashpoint arrived in 2022: despite a protection agreement signed by President Tshisekedi and Prime Minister Boris Johnson at the Glasgow climate summit in 2021, the Congolese government auctioned exploration blocks inside the park by late July 2022, attracting interest from Tullow Oil, TotalEnergies, ENI, and CNOOC. Greenpeace and other groups have warned of catastrophic ecological and social consequences, while campaigners raising public awareness face threats and intimidation on social media. Meanwhile, by 2016 four small hydropower dams were supplying electricity to over 200,000 rural residents, offering an alternative economic model.