Thousands flee Congo clash

BUKAVU, Congo – About 100,000 civilians in eastern Congo have fled a week of fighting between renegade soldiers and army loyalists, hiding deep inside the forest where humanitarian workers cannot reach them, U.N. officials said Sunday.

Battles sparked again Sunday north of Kanyabayonga, where reinforcements sent by the Kinshasa-based central government have been fighting a force largely drawn from rebels backed by neighboring Rwanda during Congo’s 1998-2002 war, said Eliane Nabaa, a U.N. spokeswoman.

Some 100,000 civilians are now believed to have fled the fighting since Dec. 12 in Congo’s eastern region on the Rwandan border, said Rachel Leflaive, a spokeswoman for the United Nations’ humanitarian operations in Congo.

Leflaive said members of the U.N.’s 11,000-strong peacekeeping mission determined the tally of the displaced after finding all-but abandoned towns and villages along a road near Kanyabayonga.

The displaced civilians are living in the surrounding forest and cannot be reached by humanitarian workers, she said. Earlier aid-agency estimates said only 35,000 had fled their homes.

Congo’s war drew in six nations and left more than 3 million dead, mostly from hunger and disease, according to aid-group estimates.

The postwar national-unity government, which includes former rebels, is trying to project its authority over the lawless east still controlled by the ex-insurgents. The army’s cohesion is viewed as a crucial test for long-term peace in Congo.

The United Nations said this week that troops from tiny Rwanda, Congo’s longtime foe, crossed into its vastly larger neighbor – raising concerns of a return to the war that embroiled Central Africa.

But Rwandan President Paul Kagame told a senior European official Sunday that Rwanda has withdrawn its threat to attack militias in eastern Congo, Rwanda’s foreign minister said.

Kagame made the decision to drop its threat to hunt down Rwandan Hutu militias based in neighboring Congo after receiving assurances from “the international community” that it would disarm the rebels, said Foreign Affairs Minister Charles Murigande.