DR Congo–Tanzania border

The middle of the lake

In 1885 the new Congo Free State declared that its limit in Lake Tanganyika was the lake’s median line, although maps attached to its earlier treaties had put the limit on the western shore. Germany held the eastern shore as German East Africa, and a Belgo-German convention of 1910 fixed their boundaries. The whole border, about 285 miles, lies in the lake; its southern end at Zambia was still unresolved in 1965.^[1]

The Liemba

Germany built the Graf von Götzen in 1913 and used her to defend Lake Tanganyika against British and Belgian forces in the First World War. Her captain scuttled her in 1916 after Belgian air raids; refloated in 1921 on the orders of Winston Churchill, she was renamed the Liemba, and she inspired C. S. Forester’s The African Queen. In 2015 she ferried Burundian refugees to the Tanzanian port of Kigoma, 600 at a time.^[2]

The Liemba once ran routes linking Tanzania, the DRC and Zambia. After three years out of service she was being restored in 2026, expected to return in August carrying up to 600 passengers, as Kigoma’s port was also expanded.^[3]

“The Liemba is said to be the oldest passenger ship in regular service in the world.”^[2]