UN warns Congo’s M23 rebels war could spill over to region

UN chief Antonio Guterres warned that the ongoing war between the central government of DR Congo and the M23 rebels in the east could spiral into a regional war.

Guterres rang the alarm bell as 178,000 people were forced to displace amid a surge in M23 insurgency in the past two weeks.

Tutsi-led M23 is surrounding Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, in an advance that had a heavy civilian toll in the mineral-rich east.

The UN Secretary-General “calls on all actors to respect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and to put an end to all forms of support to armed groups,” UN spokesman Stephen Dujarric said.

In a further escalation of hostilities, M23 rebels have seized the town of Minova in the eastern part of theDRC, a vital trade hub and key supply route for the provincial capital of Goma. the rebels also captured Katale, Masisi, and Sake towns.

The Congolese army acknowledged that the rebels had made “breakthroughs” in the towns of Minova and Bweremana, though it did not say if both had been captured. This development has triggered a mass exodus of people in the face of a new offensive by the rebel group, which has also taken strategically important mining towns of Lumbishi, Numbi and Shanje in North Kivu province in recent weeks, authorities said.

M23, or the March 23 Movement, is one of about 100 armed groups that have been vying for a foothold in DRC’s mineral-rich eastern region, in a protracted conflict that has created one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises. Since its resurgence in 2022, the M23 armed group, composed of ethnic Tutsis who broke away from the Congolese army, has continued to gain ground in the country’s volatile east. The DRC, Western powers and the United Nations have repeatedly accused Rwanda of supporting M23 with troops and weapons, a claim that Rwanda denies. More than 237,000 people have been displaced by the fighting in eastern DRC since the beginning of this year, the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, said in its latest report.

Decades-long fighting among regional armies and rebels in DRC has created one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises, with about 6 million people killed since 1998 and more than 7 million displaced internally.