Several towns that fell to armed groups in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have been recaptured by government forces, according to the Congolese army.
The Armed Forces of the DRC (FARDC) said some of the recovered towns have been occupied by rebels for months, including Ngungu, a key town in the Masisi territory that is near North Kivu’s provincial capital, Goma. Towns in South Kivu province have also been retaken.
“They [the rebels] have seen their adventure come to a halt by the FARDC,” Guillaume Ndjike Kaiko, army spokesman in North Kivu, told reporters, listing the other recovered towns as Lumbishi, Ruzirantaka, Kamatale, Bitagata and Kabingo.
“All over there, they have been pushed back,” Kaiko said on Sunday, attributing the victories to a joint military operation led by the commanders of the provinces.
Still, rebels have made advances in other areas amid intense fighting in the conflict-battered region. Some Masisi villages remain under the control of rebels, including its centre known as the Masisi Center.
DRC’s eastern region has been embroiled in conflict for decades, with more than 100 armed groups vying for territory in the mineral-rich region, near the border with Rwanda. Since 2022, the M23 rebel group has been embroiled in a conflict with the army that has displaced nearly two million people. Kinshasa and the United Nations accuse Rwanda of supporting M23 with troops and weapons – something Rwanda denies.
Conflict in this region has created one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises. Since 1998, approximately six million people have been killed while roughly seven million have been displaced internally.
News of the reclaiming of the towns brought mixed feelings among villagers who fled the areas. They worried about their safety as they celebrated their return home.
“We are in Ngungu, but we continue to suffer because the security is not well established,” said Nsabimana Alexis, a resident. “People continue to die, we just buried a person 30 minutes ago,” he said.
Rita Ritagaza, another Ngungu resident, told Al Jazeera, “We are trying to get far away from the area. M23 have been launching heavy artillery on our homes. We hope we will have a safe place for our family away from here.”
Frequent clashes between Congolese forces and M23 rebels have made dozens of villages inaccessible and out of the reach of aid.
“Conditions are really difficult. We’re overstretched and we’re looking at a grim future,” said David Munkley, NGO World Vision director for the Eastern DRC.
In Masisi, displaced camps and aid facilities are being squeezed as more people try to seek refuge from the violence, French charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said.
“We are doing our best to respond to this situation. But the severe lack of humanitarian responders in the area is making things difficult,” said Romain Briey, the MSF coordinator in Masisi.
