A group of Congolese National Army soldiers are driven in the back of a jeep near military headquarters in Minova. © AFP Phil Moore
In just a week, the rebels expanded their area of control from one small corner of North Kivu to cover almost the entire province, an area twice the size of Belgium and rich in diamonds, precious metals and mineral wealth.
Besides Goma, the rebels have also seized Sake, a strategic town at the junction of the main road south to neighbouring South Kivu province and its capital Bukavu.
Government troops unsuccessfully tried to retake the town Thursday. Since the failed operation, the area has seen no new combat.
DR Congo army troops equipped with machine guns and rocket launchers were assembled in Minova in a bid to block any rebel advance south toward Bukavu.
Fighters with the Mai Mai, a militia allied to the government, were posted several kilometres outside Minova at the front line.
The African Union said Monday it was considering the deployment of an international “neutral force” to set up a corridor between the rebels and the DR Congo army.
AU peace and security commissioner Ramtane Lamamra said Tanzania had expressed “readiness” to commit a battalion of 800 soldiers.
Regional leaders have been trying for weeks to set up a neutral force to intervene in the conflict, but without success so far.
The AU also urged “unhindered” humanitarian access to the region.
UN figures show some 1.6 million internally displaced people in North and South Kivu, including 285,000 newly displaced between July and September.
The United States said Monday that Assistant Secretary of State Johnnie Carson and his British and French counterparts had been doing shuttle diplomacy around east Africa since the weekend trying to resolve the crisis.
State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland meanwhile made it clear the US was disappointed by UN peacekeeping mission MONUSCO’s performance.
“One of the things that we need to understand better is how this relatively modest group of rebels was able to grab and hold territory, and what might be needed in terms of security and stabilisation going forward,” she said.
“We are a big supporter of MONUSCO and it needs to be effective in securing the population, which is not currently the case.”
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