By Staff Reporter
About 200,000 people have fled their homes in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in recent days, the United Nations says, as Rwanda-backed rebels swarm a strategic town just days after a United States-led peace effort, which now appears under severe threat.
The M23 armed group pushed into and around the strategic city of Uvira in South Kivu province on Wednesday, local authorities said, as part of a new offensive in which at least 74 people had been killed, according to the UN.
The latest fighting comes despite a US-mediated peace agreement signed last week by the Congolese and Rwandan presidents in Washington, DC. The accord did not include the rebels, who are negotiating separately with the DRC and agreed earlier this year to a ceasefire that both sides accuse each other of violating, but it obliges Rwanda to halt support for armed groups.
Despite the renewed fighting just beginning on Monday, the M23 has managed to capture several strongholds, including Uvira now, “a big gain”, said Al Jazeera’s Alain Uaykani, reporting from Goma, the biggest city in the eastern DRC.
Uvira has not just been a military base but also the administrative place for the government since they were chased out from the town of Bukavu in January, he said.
“So it was almost like a stronghold of the government position, from where they reorganised themselves,” Uaykani said, adding that it was also a place the government was hoping to chase out the rebels from.
“There is no DRC army in sight because the majority of them took the boat yesterday to cross into the neighbouring province of Tanganyika, and the majority of them are still making their way forward,” he added.
Gunshots were heard in the morning in the key city, and the army looted the governor’s office while leaving the town, Uaykani said.
Uvira is a strategic site because the city borders Burundi, and the Burundian army has been supporting the DRC for the last two years, he explained.
The M23 group is battling Congolese troops and other local groups, known as Wazalendo, in villages north of Uvira.
