Rival armed groups have clashed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DR Congo) east, killing five civilians and forcing more than 50,000 to flee, the UN said on Saturday, after a six-month lull in fighting.
Clashes have erupted between local armed groups and the M23 rebel movement in North Kivu Province, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
“The resurgence of violent clashes since Oct. 1 raises concern about a fresh deterioration in the humanitarian situation,” the office said.
Photo: AFP
About 51,000 people had been “forced to flee their homes” in the DR Congo.
The main armed groups operating in North Kivu had met in the provincial capital, Goma, at the end of last month and declared themselves ready to lay down arms.
Within days coordinated attacks were launched on villages in Masisi and Rutshuru territory.
Video footage posted on social media, shows militia members saying they are “volunteers to defend the nation” before filming themselves firing at homes and setting them ablaze.
The fighting has led to traffic being halted on one of the province’s main roads.
The head of a local defense group known as “General” Guidon Shimiray, who faces UN Security Council sanctions and is wanted by the DR Congo government, on Friday paraded with his men in the town of Kitshanga,50km from Goma. The M23 rebel group chased the army out of the town in January.
A Kitshanga resident on Saturday said that “in the morning shots rang out ... local self-defense groups fled.”
“Some stole goods from people,” as they went, before M23 rebels took control of the area, he added, asking not to be named.
Other local people contacted by telephone said they had left for the north for their own safety.
A nurse said that hundreds had sought refuge in a health center, including five with bullet wounds.
On Friday evening in the village of Kyangitsi, at least 15 people were killed after a group of children brought home an explosive device that they had found while they were playing, a community leader said on Saturday.
“At around 8pm local time, while some of the residents were trying to find out what it was, the bomb exploded,” said Telesphore Mitondeke, a member of a Masisi grouping of civil society organizations.
Mitondeke said the area “is littered with numerous explosive devices abandoned and booby-trapped by fighters.”
M23 rebels, backed by Rwanda, have captured swathes of North Kivu, displacing more than 1 million people since re-emerging to launch an offensive in late 2021.
Additional reporting by AP
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