GOMA, DR Congo: Congolese rebels said Tuesday they had agreed to pull out of the key eastern city of Goma by week’s end following a round of diplomatic efforts to prevent the conflict from spreading across the region but Kinshasa met the pledge with caution.
The M23’s rebellion has displaced tens of thousands of people and its quick advance across the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo had heightened fears of yet another major conflict in the war-blighted region.
“Tomorrow or the day after… in three days at the latest we will leave Goma,” M23 military leader Sultani Makenga said. “We were asked to withdraw 20 kilometres (12 miles) and we will do it, there is no problem.”
The deal was struck late Monday in the capital of neighbouring Uganda between Makenga and regional military commanders, who will visit Goma on Friday to monitor progress of the promised withdrawal from the capital of the mineral-rich Kivu region.
Makenga said his forces had already started redeploying but said that some remote units would need time to complete their pullback.
M23 political leader Jean-Marie Runiga had said earlier that the rebels would only withdraw if the Kinshasa government of President Joseph Kabila met a string of demands.
The M23 was created in April by a group of former Tutsi rebels who had been integrated in the regular army in a 2009 deal which they argue was never fully implemented.
The agreement allowed them to stay in their home region of Kivu, which is believed to hold up to three quarters of the world’s reserves of coltan, a mineral used in the manufacture of many electronic products.
But the rebels’ grievances also delved into Kinshasa politics with a demand for the release of opposition standard-bearer Etienne Tshisekedi, a former prime minister who has been under unofficial house arrest since declaring victory in flawed elections last year that were officially won by Kabila.
The rebels are also demanding direct talks with the president and the dissolution of the electoral commission.
“The withdrawal is at the stage of announcement… We get paid to exercise caution when people who never keep their word make promises,” government spokesman Lambert Mende said.
Ugandan army chief Aronda Nyakairima said Makenga had attached “no conditions” to the pullout but were concerned about a backlash against civilians after their pullout.
“They are so concerned that maybe once they leave those areas some of their people will be killed,” he said.
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.
The new fighting, as well as reported atrocities including killings, rapes and abductions of civilians, has forced tens of thousands of people to flee their homes in a spiralling humanitarian crisis.
 Makenga was slapped with UN and US sanctions last week over the alleged atrocities.
Besides Goma, the rebels also seized Sake, a strategic town on the way to South Kivu province and its capital Bukavu.
Hutu militiamen ‘attack Rwandan forces ‘
The powderkeg region was the cradle of two wars that shook DR Congo between 1996 and 1997, and then again from 1998 to 2003, with Rwanda and Uganda playing active roles.
The wars, which included fighting in some of Africa’s remotest forests, have left a huge but unknown number of people killed.
 The UN has issued damning report accusing Rwanda, and to a lesser extent Uganda, of backing the rebels. Both countries deny the allegations.
The region is home to a complex web of Congolese and foreign rebel groups and militias, and the DR Congo and Rwanda have long traded accusations of bankrolling or arming one or more of these groups.
Adding to the instability in the region, the Rwandan army claimed Tuesday that ethnic Hutu extremists based in eastern DR Congo crossed into Rwanda and attacked its forces along the border.
Army spokesman Joseph Nzabamwita said Rwandan soldiers repelled around 100 of the militiamen from the villages of Cyanzarwe and Bugeshi which he said they had attacked around dawn.
The Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) are Rwandan Hutu rebels who fled into DR Congo after minority Tutsi leader Paul Kagame’s forces ended the 1994 genocide there.
Some of their current leaders are suspected of playing a part in the bloodbath, during which at least 800,000 people — mostly Tutsis — were massacred in 100 days, and remain opposed to Kagame’s regime.
The FDLR, believed to have between 3,000 and 4,400 members, is the most powerful rebel force in the region, according to the United Nations.
Kagame’s government accuses Kinshasa of backing the FDLR.
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