26/08/13 Aljazeera: US 'alarmed' by eastern DR Congo violence

After a two-month lull,
fighting between the army and the M23 has erupted sporadically since mid-July
in North Kivu, a chronically unstable region
with the mining hub of Goma as its capital.

The State Department
condemned attacks by the M23 that killed at least three people in Goma
on Saturday. It also expressed concern over reports by the
United Nations of shelling by the M23 into Rwanda territory. 

"We urgently call on
(the) DRC and Rwandan governments to exercise restraint to prevent
military escalation of the conflict or any action that puts civilians at
risk," State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said in a statement.

"We are deeply
concerned about evidence of increasing ethnic tensions in Goma and call on
all parties to avoid any actions that could exacerbate such tensions."

A 3,000-member UN
Intervention Brigade has been deployed to fight and disarm rebels in the
east and has this week been drawn into the fighting for the first time, firing
artillery and fighting alongside the Congolese army on the front lines.

Sanctions considered

The spokeswoman praised UN
efforts to protect civilians, after the world body announced it had opened a
probe into accusations by residents that peacekeepers killed two people who
tried to storm its Goma base during a protest.

Harf said the US was ready to
consider further targeted sanctions against M23 rebel leaders and other armed
groups. Some M23 leaders are already subject to UN Security Council sanctions.

Washington urged the UN mission in Congo, MONUSCO,
to investigate charges of cross-border shelling. Rwanda said
five mortar bombs had fallen on Rwandan villages on Friday, following a
rocket the previous day, and blamed Congo's army.

Rwanda twice invaded its larger neighbour in the 1990s and sponsored
rebels trying to topple the Kinshasa
government.

Millions have died since
then in Congo's
eastern border area, a patchwork of rebel and militia fiefdoms in an area
rich in tin as well as tungsten and coltan ores.

A UN report in June said
the M23 recruited fighters in Rwanda
with the aid of sympathetic Rwandan army officers, while elements of the
Congolese army have cooperated with the Rwandan Hutu rebel group FDLR, which Rwanda denies.