Rwandan-backed rebels shut down major Congolese city

Rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo have besieged the eastern city of Goma in one of the sharpest escalations in years of conflict between the central African nation and neighboring Rwanda.

Rebels from the Rwandan-backed M23 group overran Sake on Thursday morning, forcing Congolese forces to retreat quickly, humanitarian officials and witnesses said. It was the last major army position before Goma, the provincial capital of more than 2 million people.

The fall of Goma would be a major milestone for the group, which seized the city and held it for two weeks in 2012 but withdrew after coming under intense international pressure to stop supporting Rwandan militia. The United States and the United Nations say Rwanda funds and controls M23, charges Rwanda denies.

In late 2013, the Congolese army and United Nations forces quickly defeated the rebel group, which had been dormant for almost a decade.

M23 has since retreated, inflicting a series of major defeats on the Congolese army beginning in late 2021. Meanwhile, peace talks led by Congo’s southwestern neighbor Angola have stalled, and the fate of UN peacekeepers was up in the air until recently, when their mandate was renewed in December for just one year.

Goma, a hub for humanitarian organizations, UN agencies and foreign diplomatic missions in eastern Congo, has been a haven for more than a million civilians fleeing violence by M23 militias, Congolese forces and other armed groups in the region.

The rebels launched a major offensive this year, and now the city increasingly cut off. The rebels immediately control the area north and west of Goma. To its east is the border with Rwanda. Its south is separated by the coastline of Lake Kivu.

Wounded civilians who fled Sake arrived on foot and on motorbikes on Thursday morning at the Goma hospital run by the International Committee of the Red Cross. The group’s top surgeon, Abdurahmane Sidibé, said he and his colleagues have treated twice as many civilians in the past few weeks as compared to last year.

“There was too much bombardment,” said Hawa Amisi, 52, who fled with only a thin mattress, a bottle of water and four children with nothing to eat. Mrs. Amisi, who was separated from her husband during the confrontation, said she saw dead bodies lying on the street as she ran. “So many people died,” he said.

Bruno Lemarquis, the United Nations’ top humanitarian official in Congo, said 2025 would be a “difficult year” as humanitarian needs are expected to increase and funds to decrease.

With peace talks collapsing in December, a distracted world’s attention waning and the United States — traditionally Congo’s biggest humanitarian donor — expected to cut aid, humanitarian officials and experts fear one of the world’s biggest crises will be further ignored.

“Even before the new US administration took office, we were told that US humanitarian aid would be cut by a third,” Mr. Lemarquiz said.

Caleb Kabanda and Saikou Jammeh reported from Goma and Dakar.