Congo rebels retake lost town

Rwanda's army is pulling back in eastern DR Congo

By the BBC's Helen Vespirini in Kigali

Congolese rebels supported by Rwanda say they have recaptured the town of Fizi on the north-western shore of Lake Tanganyika.

The news comes a month after the town fell to a coalition of Rwandan and Burundian Hutu rebels with the backing of the Kinshasa government.

The secretary-general of the Goma rebels, Azarias Ruberwa, said a spokesman for the movement had been premature when he told journalists that Fizi had already been recaptured last weekend.

The acting chief of staff of the Goma rebels, Gabriel Amisi, speaking from Fizi by satellite phone, said the town had been back under his control since Friday afternoon.

He said the militia who were routed fled onto Lake Tanganyika, and he accused the Kinshasa government, which is sympathetic both to Burundi's Forces for the Defence of Democracy and the Rwandan Interahamwe militia, of violating the ceasefire, using the rebels as a proxy army.

Humanitarian fears

So far, there are no casualty figures, but the use of heavy artillery in the fight for the town is likely to have left a number of people dead.

Humanitarian groups say up to 8,000 people fled the town to take refuge in the bush while the fighting was going on.

Fizi fell to Burundian and Rwandan Hutu rebels on 7 September after Burundian government forces scaled back their presence in the area in order to attend to problems at home.

The fighting in Fizi, together with an attack on the town of Kindu further to the north a week ago, has made the seven-month-old ceasefire in Congo look extremely precarious.