Serious fighting reported on eastern front

Three separate offensives in Kasai and Katanga provinces - two by the rebel Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie (RCD) and Rwandese Patriotic Army (RPA), and one by the Forces armees congolaises (FAC) and its allies from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) - represent a serious deterioration in the DRC conflict, military and diplomatic sources told IRIN on Wednesday. They added that the situation was very dangerous for the region as a whole. On the one hand, according to independent sources within the country, the RCD and RPA have undertaken the offensive that caused the fighting around Idumbe in Kasai Occidental, and which analysts consider may be an effort to cut communications between Ilebo and Kananga. Between 150 and 200 government and allied soldiers are believed to have been killed in the offensive, the sources said. At the same time, the RCD and RPA have reportedly launched another attack around Kabinda, and there is speculation that both of these operations may be part of a grand plan to isolate the allied-held diamond centre of Mbuji-Mayi.

The government side, meanwhile, has not been standing still and has launched its own offensive in North Katanga and South Kivu along a line between Kabalo and Kongolo, independent military sources said. There are no reports of casualties but, again, this is reported to be a large operation. What is clear, according to analysts, is that these military offensives - all of them ongoing - are not just skirmishes or low-intensity ceasefire violations, but are “preplanned large scale offensive actions”. In contrast, the northern front is reported to be quiet at the moment, but “extensive preparations” for war suggest that it will not remain so, the observers added.