Clashes continue in eastern Congo days after attack on civilians left many dead

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(Reuters) -Fighting between M23 rebels and pro-Congo militias was underway on Sunday in Nyabiondo, about 100 km (62 miles) north of Goma in eastern Congo, residents said, days after a nearby attack left a heavy civilian death toll, according to the United Nations and an NGO.

The Rwanda-backed rebel group M23 has seized swathes of mineral-rich eastern Congo since the start of the year.

“M23 has taken Nyabiondo since 11 a.m. (0900 GMT), following clashes,” Kipanda Biiri, an official from the local administrative authority who was fleeing the area, told Reuters.

“The enemy opened a large-scale assault on Nyabiondo this morning,” said Telesphore Mitondeke, a civil society rapporteur in Masisi, the area where Nyabiondo is located, referring to M23 rebels.

“For the moment there is shooting from every direction in the centre of Nyabiondo, where the clashes are taking place.”

The fighting follows clashes last week between M23 and a pro-Congolese government militia in the village of Tambi, about 18 km northeast of the town of Masisi, which culminated in an attack overnight on March 5 leaving many civilian casualties, according to the head of a local NGO.

An internal United Nations memo seen by Reuters on Sunday said between 40 and 70 civilians were believed to have been killed in that attack.

Separately on Sunday, a spokesperson for the rebel alliance that includes M23 said on X that one of the pro-government militias that operates in eastern Congo had switched sides and joined its alliance.

The spokesperson for the group that militia had been a part of said in a statement that the rest of the group remained loyal to the Congolese government and its army.

M23 rebels say that they intend to seize power in Congo’s capital Kinshasa. They also accuse Congo’s government of not living up to previous peace deals and fully integrating Congolese Tutsis into the army and administration.

The group’s spread into new mineral-rich territories this year also gives it scope to acquire more mining revenue, analysts say.

In Washington, the State Department said in a statement to Reuters on Sunday that the United States was open to exploring critical minerals partnerships with Congo, after a Congolese senator contacted U.S. officials to pitch a minerals-for-security deal.

Congo is rich in cobalt, lithium and uranium among other minerals.

(Reporting by Congo newsroom and Ange Kasongo Adihe; Writing by Portia Crowe; Editing by Clelia Oziel and Sandra Maler)