Fighting has broken out between the army and local militia in Ituri in the north-east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, a military spokesperson said on Friday.
”Two stations held by our soldiers were attacked yesterday [Thursday] evening by a group of militia in Nyamavi and in Boguma,” said captain Charles Boeka, a spokesman for the Central African country’s armed forces in Ituri.
The militiamen took control of the two stations, which are in Kasenyi, around 30km south-east of Bunia.
But the Nyamavi station was retaken the following day with the help of UN troops sent to the region to support the Congolese army.
”An attack helicopter provided back-up to the troops on the ground, firing 32 rockets. The Congolese forces who were occupying Nyamavi and who had abandoned their post were able to regroup with the help of the blue berets,” said the UN mission in DRC in a statement.
The Congolese army was Friday heading on towards Boguma on the bank of Lake Albert on the Angolan border, Boeka said.
The militia were part of the Congolese Revolutionary Movement, a group founded in June 2005 in Kampala that brings together fighters from different, and previously rival, militia groups.
The UN mission in DRC believes the group’s latest offensive demonstrates its determination to extend its area of influence and reestablish access routes into the DRC from neighbouring countries.
Many of these were cut off at the end of 2005 following a series of operations by Congolese and UN troops.
The UN mission said the ease with which the militia were able to take control of the two army stations demonstrated the ”weakness and lack of morale of certain units of the Congolese army”.
One military observer said there was a risk that the lack of training given to the Congolese forces, who are poorly paid and ill equipped, could endanger the electoral process in certain parts of Ituri.
The DRC, formerly known as Zaire, is due to hold presidential and general elections in June.
The country is slowly making a UN-supervised transition towards democracy after a war in which about four million people have died since 1998 and 1,6-million others have been left homeless. – Sapa-AFP