March 23 movement (M23) rebels have fired two rockets into the eastern Congolese city of Goma killing one person and wounding four, officials say.
The two rockets exploded in Goma’s Ndosho neighborhood on Wednesday, said Col. Premanku Ghosh, a UN peacekeeping officer in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), The Associated Press reported.
He said civilians were among the casualties.
The M23 rebels, however, accuse the government forces of launching the attack first.
“The FARDC (Congolese army) has been attacking us since 6 a.m. (2400 GMT) with mortars, tanks and rocket launchers in the Mutaho area,” M23 military spokesman Vianney Kazarama told AFP.
Wednesday marked the third straight day of fighting between the rebels and government forces near the strategic city of Goma, after a nearly six-month lull in fighting in the troubled east.
The new round of clashes between government forces and the rebels began on Monday. Residents of nearby refugee camps have been fleeing in their hundreds since then.
Meanwhile, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon arrived in Congo’s capital Kinshasa for a two-day visit expected to take him to the flashpoint city of Goma.
The mandate of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Congo, known as MONUSCO, was recently renewed by the UN Security Council. The new mandate allows the creation of a special unit, called the Force Intervention Brigade, to carry out targeted offensive operations against armed groups rather than merely protecting civilians. The forces of the special unit are expected to arrive in the country before July 1.
The UN has nearly 20,000 peacekeepers in eastern Congo.
The M23 rebels seized Goma on November 20, 2012 after UN peacekeepers gave up the battle for the frontier city of one million people. M23 fighters withdrew from the city on December 1 under a ceasefire accord.
The M23 rebels defected from the Congolese army in April 2012 in protest over alleged mistreatment in the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo (FARDC). They had previously been integrated into the Congolese army under a peace deal signed in 2009.
Since early May 2012, nearly 3 million people have fled their homes in the eastern Congo. About 2.5 million have resettled in Congo, but more than 460,000 have crossed into neighboring Rwanda and Uganda.
Congo has faced numerous problems over the past few decades, such as grinding poverty, crumbling infrastructure, and a war in the east of the country that has dragged on since 1998 and left over 5.5 million people dead.
MN/MHB
This article originally appeared on : Press TV