Congo rebels near outskirts of key city

GOMA, Congo — A rebel group believed to be backed by Rwanda advanced to within two miles of Goma, a crucial provincial capital in eastern Congo, marking the first time that rebels have come this close since 2008.

Congolese army spokesman Col. Olivier Hamuli said the fighting has been going on since 6 a. m. Sunday and the front line has moved to just a few miles outside the city. After more than nine hours of violent clashes, the two sides took a break just after 3 p. m., with M23 rebels establishing a checkpoint just 100 yards away from one held by the military in the village of Munigi, exactly 1.8 miles outside the Goma city line.

M23 spokesman Col. Vianney Kazarama initially said the rebels would spend the night in Goma. In the afternoon after the fi ghting stopped, he said, “We can take Goma easily now, we have pushed the Congolese army back over 10 kilometers ( six miles) in one day.”

“We are confi dent that we can take Goma and then our next step will be to take Bukavu,” he said, referring to the capital of the next province to the south.

The M23 rebel group is made up of soldiers from a now- defunct rebel army, the National Congress for the Defense of the People, or CNDP, a group made- up primarily of fi ghters from the Tutsi ethnic group, the ethnicity that was targeted in Rwanda’s 1994 genocide. In 2008, the CNDP led by Rwandan commando Gen. Laurent Nkunda marched his soldiers to the doorstep of Goma, abruptly stopping just before taking the city.