Heavy toll from DR Congo fighting

The International Committee of the Red Cross says that more than five-hundred people were killed during the recent fighting in Kisangani in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

More than four hundred of the victims were civilians; the rest were troops from Rwanda and Uganda who were fighting for control of the city.

Relief workers have warned that the final toll could be even higher.

Meanwhile in Geneva, the UN Secretary General's special envoy to Congo, Kamel Morjane, told a news conference that the rival armies have now pulled out of Kisangani. Reports from Kisangani suggest that the Ugandan army is still just north of the city, and the Rwandans have pulled back at least fifty kilometres to the south.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service