Congo Conflict Escalates: UN Condemns External Forces #Congo #Rewanda #BBCnews

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The UN Security Council has condemned what it calls the unauthorised presence of external forces in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo At the council meeting in New York the United States France and Britain said Rwandan troops had supported the rapid advance of M-XXIII rebel forces into the centre of Goma The rebels say they now have control of the city and have urged its other one million inhabitants to remain calm After several hours of gunfire on Sunday night The streets are reported to be quiet this morning with no reports of serious bloodshed Well let's bring in our Africa correspondent Barbara Plett-Usher who's following these events for us from Nairobi Barbara what more can you tell us about what's been happening in the last 24 hours Well Sally the M-XXIII has been advancing on Goma amid intense fighting in the past couple of days actually And in the past 24 hours the rebel group says that it has taken control of the city It says that it is currently at the city stadium registering weapons from surrendering Congolese soldiers who had issued an ultimatum for them to disarm by a certain time And it says at this point it's doing that and has posted photographs to back up what it's saying a report or a notice separately from the Uruguay contingent of the UN peacekeeping force saying that indeed some Congolese soldiers have surrendered But at the same time the Congolese government has issued a statement denying that the M-XXIII controls the city saying that the Congolese government is still in control of the main strategic points including the airport and that the M-XXIII is on the outskirts So we don't have full confirmation yet of who exactly is in control But the M- 23 is very much in the area And as we have been reporting the big concern the most immediate concern of course is the fate of civilians because there are about a million people living in the city But then nearly that same number of people who've been displaced by the war in eastern Congo who were living in very big camps around Goma and have been on the move since the M23 started to advance And so we have as you said not heard any reports of major bloodshed so far and that is some something that is of great concern to all the authorities watching Now Kenya is saying that they're trying to obviously broker some sort of peace in this scenario that the presence of Rwanda and Congo will meet in the next few days What is the hope that the 2 could come to some kind of agreement about what's happening there Well they had failed to come to some kind of agreement in December when they were quite close to reaching one in a process that was mediated by Angola And that broke down because the Rwandans withdrew saying they couldn't continue because Congo the Congolese government refused to negotiate directly with the M-XXIII The Congolese government is convinced that it's Rwanda that's really behind all this Rwanda backs the M-XXIII Kinshasa has accused it of sending forces over the border to help the M-XXIII in its something that Rwanda denies Now that particular version of events is supported by many Western countries by the UN The UN secretary-general has called on Rwanda to withdraw its forces The Security Council didn't name Rwanda but said external forces should pull back And a UN report issued in the last year or so basically said there were 3 to four thousand Rwandan soldiers in the Congo and that one of the reasons they were supporting M-XXIII was because they were helping to get minerals from Congo which they then re-exported So that's the context The Rwandans say no none of that is true They place this in the context of the 1994 genocide The Hutus who carried out the genocide escaped into Congo and have been there in a militia ever since and the Congolese army has been allied with them in its fighting So it says that this is the real concern Can you get past all of those concerns to reach an agreement That is something that is a great focus now because the U has warned of a wider regional war and many people are saying this is something that cannot be settled militarily It is a political conflict and it needs some kind of political peaceful resolution So the Kenyans say that both leaders the leaders of Rwanda and the DRC are willing to come to this summit So we'll see whether this latest military advance will have made any difference in terms of reaching a resolution OK For now thank you very much Barbara Plett-Usher there in Nairobi for us

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