Getty ImagesRebels of the M23 movement state that they have brought the city of Goma under its control in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Local residents shared videos of M23 rebels, which patrolled in the main streets of Goma after a lightning morning car had taken place against the Congolese army on Sunday, in which tens of thousands of people fled from neighboring cities.
According to local media reports, it is now quiet after hours of shots and explosions in the streets of Goma – home of more than one million people.
It only comes a few hours after the DR Congo Rwanda foreign minister has accused the war by sending its troops across the border to support the M23 rebels. Rwanda says Kinshasa supports militias who want a change of regime in Kigali.
Kenya has asked for an armistice and announced that the presidents of the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwandas will take part in a regional emergency summit over the next two days.
The Kenyan President William Ruto, the current chairman of the East African community, said that it was the task of the regional leaders to contribute to a peaceful solution to the conflict.
The M23 group has taken control of large parts of the mineral east of the DR Kongo since 2021. In the past few weeks, the group in the midst of violent fights has quickly moved up to Goma.
According to the UN refugee agency, more than 400,000 people in North and South Kivu, provinces near the border with Rwanda, have been sold since the beginning of 2025.
A displaced woman, Alice Feza, said she doesn’t know what to do next because she has fled from Kiwanja, Rutshuru, Kibumba and now Goma.
“People flee everywhere and we no longer know where to go because we started flight a long time ago,” said Ms. Feza and added: “The war caught us here with the host families, now nowhere can we there.” .”
According to the United Nations, important roads around Goma are blocked and the city airport can no longer be used for evacuation and humanitarian purposes.
Getty ImagesUN General Secretary António Guterres has asked Rwanda to deduct its armed forces from the area of the Democratic Republic of Congo and asked the rebel group M23 to stop their advance.
In a statement by his spokesman, Rwanda asked Guterres to “stop support for the M23 and to withdraw from the area of the Democratic Republic of Congo”. He also asked the M23 to “set all enemy actions immediately and to withdraw from the occupied areas”.
This was done after 13 soldiers of the peace troops were killed in collisions with the rebels.
The United Kingdom has called for an end to the attacks on peace troops, while France’s UN representative Nicolas de Rivière repeated Guterres’s demand to Rwanda to withdraw his troops from DR Congo.
Both the Democratic Republic of Congo and the UN state that the M23 group is supported by Rwanda.
Rwanda did not deny this, but the leadership of the country blames the DR Congo for the current conflict.
At the session of the security council, Rwanda’s UN representative Ernest Rwamucyo said that he regretted that the international community decided to condemn the M23 group and not the Congolese army, which in his opinion had violated an armistice.
On Saturday, the United Nations announced that they would deduct their entire staff from Goma. Significant operations run in the DR Congo.
The M23 formed in 2012 as a branch of another rebel group, supposedly to protect the Tutsi population in the east of the DR Congo, which had long been complaining about persecution and discrimination.
Rwanda previously explained that the Congolese authorities worked with some of those responsible for the genocide in Rwanda in ethnic tuts and moderate Hutus in 1994.
However, Rwanda’s critics accuse the country of looting minerals such as gold, cobalt and tantalum with the M23 in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
