News | Conflict
M23 armed group says it begins withdrawing from key DR Congo town of Uvira
Exclusive Al Jazeera footage shows fighters, military vehicles on the move as M23 spokespeople say withdrawal under way.
The M23 armed group has begun pulling out its forces from the key town of Uvira in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), its spokespeople say, in accordance with a request from United States mediators in the conflict.
Footage aired exclusively on Al Jazeera on Wednesday appeared to show dozens of fighters from the group and numerous vehicles on the move from the M23’s main base in the strategic town.
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Willy Ngoma, an M23 spokesperson, posted on X that the withdrawal was under way.
“For the sake of peace, our troops began leaving the town of Uvira this afternoon,” he said.
Bertrand Bisimwa, head of the M23’s political wing, said the movement of forces would be completed by Thursday.
“We call upon the civilian population to remain calm,” he posted on X, adding that the group called on mediators and other partners to ensure the town was “protected from violence, retaliation, and re-militarisation”.
Attention has focused on the town, located in South Kivu province near the border with Burundi, since it was seized by the Rwanda-backed militia last week, imperilling a tenuous US-brokered peace agreement between Kinshasa and Kigali signed amid fanfare just days earlier and raising fears of a widening conflict.
After warnings from the US, the group said earlier this week that it would withdraw from the town as a “unilateral trust-building measure” to give the peace process a chance to succeed.
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