A town just west of the major east Congo city of Goma appeared under army control hours after hundreds of residents fled an outbreak of gunfire for fear of an advance by M23 rebels, according to a Reuters reporter in the area.
Hundreds of people had left Sake earlier in the day, lugging their belongings along a 15-kilometre (9-mile) stretch of road to Goma, worried they might get caught up in fighting between the army and M23. The government accuses M23 of mass atrocities against civilians over the past year, something it denies.
But later on Thursday soldiers accompanied a Reuters reporter to the city where residents were found going about their daily activities after the morning panic.
Residents said the army had the town under control. Two residents said the shots they heard were from soldiers firing in the air after going off duty.
“The population panicked this morning at the bad behaviour of our soldiers who had just been relieved. They fired in the air and that scared the population very much,” said teacher Jospin Simwerayi, a Sake resident.
The army did not comment on why the shots were fired. The M23 did not respond to requests for comment. According to Kivu Security Tracker, which maps unrest in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, the army and the M23 have been clashing north of Sake since Monday.
The Tutsi-led M23 staged a comeback last year after they were chased into neighbouring Rwanda and Uganda in 2013. The fighting has uprooted tens of thousands of civilians in Congo’s restive east despite military efforts to push back M23.
Battles broke out in November around Kibumba, an area 20 kilometres north of Goma that rebels were meant to have left a month later as part of a ceasefire brokered by East African regional leaders.
But there has been evidence of M23 movements in places from which they were meant to withdraw as well as signs of advances in other areas, suggesting the offensive is ongoing. The group has denied this.
