Thousands of refugees had only just arrived in Goma, displaced after rebel forces pushed through their villages [AFP]
Published On 30 Oct 200830 Oct 2008
The fighters belong to the rebel National Congress for the Defence of the People (NCDP) [AFP]
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The NCDP is led by renegade army general Laurent Nkunda [AFP]
The roots of Nkunda's rebellion lie in the ethnic and political tensions that have persisted in the east of the country since the Rwanda genocide of 1994 [AFP]
Nkunda says he is fighting to protect his Tutsi people in the east of the country against attacks by the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a Rwandan Hutu group.AFP]
The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has tried pacifying the east of the country, but has so far failed to fully end the conflict that has raged for the past 10 years [AFP].
The UN peacekeeping force, Monuc, has been accused of failing to stop the rebel advance in northern Kivu [AFP]
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But the UN's peacekeeping chief says his troops are overstretched and that there is urgent need for more support[EPA]
With forces loyal to Nkunda still advancing, up to one million Congolese could be displaced[EPA]
The Kibati camp, just north of Goma, has seen an influx of 30,000 people over the past three days, joining 15,000 Congolese already there [EPA]
Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, says the violence in the DRC is creating a "humanitarian catastrophe" [EPA]
But there has been no let up in the fighting and government troops are being pushed further south by the advancing rebels[EPA]
