Ruzizi River

Along its upstream reaches, the river forms part of the border between Rwanda on the east with the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) on the west. To the west, the Fizi Baraka mountains tower over the river. The Bridge of Concord, Burundi's longest bridge, crosses the river near its mouth. Tributaries of the Ruzizi River include the Nyamagana, Muhira, Kaburantwa, Kagunuzi, Rubyiro and Ruhwa, among others. The Ruzizi River, flowing south into Lake Tanganyika, is part of the upper watershed of the Congo River. Nineteenth-century British explorers such as Richard Francis Burton and John Hanning Speke, uncertain of the direction of flow of the Ruzizi, thought that it might flow north out of the lake toward the White Nile. Their research and follow-up explorations by David Livingstone and Henry Morton Stanley established that this was not the case. The Ruzizi flows into Lake Tanganyika, which overflows into the Lukuga River about south of Ujiji. The Lukuga flows west into the Lualaba River, a major tributary of the Congo. ==Geology==

Rifting, the slow pulling apart of a tectonic plate, has produced the East African Rift system and its many basins and lakes. The system, on the boundary between the African Plate (Nubian Plate) and the Somali Plate, has two branches, both oriented north–south. Rifting in the western branch, called the Albertine Rift, began between 25 and 10 million years ago. Uplift associated with the rifting altered the connections among the region's water bodies. Water from Lake Kivu was then forced south down the Ruzizi. This, in turn, raised the level of Lake Tanganyika, which overflowed down the Lukuga River. Variations in uplift and climate have caused the Ruzizi and Lukuga to open and close multiple times since then. == Hydroelectricity ==

The Ruzizi I Hydroelectric Power Station was built at the Ruzizi River outlet from Lake Kivu in 1958. The Ruzizi II Hydroelectric Power Station was added in 1989. Ruzizi I and II are operated by a tri-national company (Burundi, Rwanda and Democratic Republic of the Congo) owned by the Economic Community of the Great Lakes Countries. The consortium is planning two more dams, Ruzizi III and Ruzizi IV. It is expected to provide 287 MW to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda and Burundi. ==Fauna and flora==

Reed swamps are common along the lower main stem of the river and its tributaries. Near the mouth, the riparian swamps are up to wide. The swamps' total area in Burundi has been estimated at with reeds varying in height from , depending on the degree of inundation. Residents use the reeds for thatching and other domestic purposes. Further from the river, much of the lower river valley consists of grassland, heavily grazed by cattle. In the film documenting Gustave ("Capturing the Killer Croc"), the narrator states that "In the 1950s, buffalo, elephants and common warthogs inhabited the plain; but they were progressively exterminated by man. The only survivor amongst the large mammals has been the hippopotamus. And they share the river, in an uneasy co-existence, with the nile crocodiles." ==See also==