Eastern DRC ‘at breaking point’ as security, humanitarian crises worsen
Al Jazeera
UN warns of deteriorating situation as M23 rebels continue to make gains, displacing hundreds of thousands of civilians.
War is on the doorstep of eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo’s Goma city and the region is at breaking point, activists and aid workers have said, as the United Nations sounds an alarm over the situation in the Central African country.
“One Congolese person out of four faces hunger and malnutrition,” Bintou Keita, the head of the UN’s DRC peacekeeping mission MONUSCO, told the UN Security Council this week, warning of a rapidly deteriorating security situation and a humanitarian crisis reaching near catastrophic levels.
“More than 7.1 million people have been displaced in the country. That is 800,000 people more since my last briefing three months ago,” she said.
Heavy fighting between the Congolese army and armed group M23 has intensified in the eastern part of the country since February, forcing hundreds of thousands of civilians to flee their homes as the rebels make territorial gains.
The armed group “is making significant advances and expanding its territory to unprecedented levels”, Keita said at the UN on Wednesday.
