28 10 13 AFP: Fighting rages in eastern DR Congo

The
latest fighting in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo erupted on Friday,
less than a week after Kinshasa and
the M23 rebels announced that peace talks in Kampala had collapsed.

The army
late on Saturday said it had recaptured Kibumba, an outpost about 25 kilometres (16 miles) north of the
country's eastern hub of Goma that commands access to rebel territory further
north.

"Kibumba
is under FARDC (regular army) control as of tonight," a senior military
officer told an AFP reporter in Goma. The rebels could not immediately be
reached for comment.

Another front
flared up Saturday when the army attacked an M23 position in the
Mabenga region, around 80
kilometres (50 miles) north of Goma and closer to the
border with Uganda.

The army
"has launched an offensive on the Mabenga-Kahunga road. It is using
troops, tanks and mortar shells," another army officer said, speaking on
condition of anonymity.

The
rebels confirmed that the fighting had spread north.

"It's
heating up on all fronts," the M23's political leader Bertrand
Bisimwa said on his movement's website.

UN chief
Ban Ki-moon's top envoys to the conflict, Mary Robinson and Martin Kobler,
issued a statement voicing grave concern over the fresh fighting.

"We
request all parties to exercise maximum restraint and to resume negotiations in
Kampala,"
they said.

Rebels
claimed the army attacked their positions early Friday, but the military
insisted it came under attack first — a claim supported by a source from the
UN peacekeeping mission in the country, MONUSCO.

On
Monday, both sides announced a halt to peace talks in Kampala.

The
Congolese refused to give amnesty to about 80 leaders of
the M23 rebellion but a report by UN envoys stressed that a
"considerable military buildup" by the rebels had not been conducive
to a deal.

The
negotiations were part of a framework both sides agreed to last year, following
a rebel offensive that saw the M23 briefly take control of Goma.

The UN
has since deployed a special brigade of 3,000 African forces with an
unprecedented offensive mandate but observers remain wary of an escalation that
could draw in the entire region.

Rwanda, which lies just a few miles from
the areas where the fighting took place Saturday, on Friday accused the
Congolese army of firing three shells over the border into its territory and
threatened to retaliate.

EU
foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton called on "all actors in the region
to prevent further escalation and internationalisation of the conflict."

"The
reported impact across the border in Rwanda of recent actions should
also be jointly investigated," she said.

Kinshasa has long accused Kigali of pulling the
strings behind the rebellion and UN experts have even said that the M23's
"de facto chain of command" was topped by Rwanda's defence minister.

Rwanda has vehemently denied accusations
that it is arming, financing and supporting the rebels by sending some of its
own forces to the frontlines in DR Congo.

Rwanda in turn has accused Kinshasa of
coordinating attacks against Kigali
with the FDLR, a DR Congo-based Rwandan group which includes the remnants of
Hutu militia who carried out the 1994 genocide.