UNITED NATIONS — Rwanda and Uganda helped rebels in Democratic Republic of Congo stage a major offensive in the east of the country last month, UN experts said in a report obtained by AFP on Monday.
Hundreds of Rwandan troops bolstered M23 rebels as they took the key city of Goma, while Uganda provided "logistics" support, said a report by the UN sanctions experts sent to the UN Security Council.
The new investigation by the experts piles more pressure on the Rwandan government over its role in the DR Congo conflict as it prepares to take up a seat on the Security Council on January 1, diplomats said.
The 15-member council and UN leader Ban Ki-moon have repeatedly condemned external support for the rebels without naming any country.
The experts said their inquiry "strongly upholds" previous accusations that the neighboring countries provided major backing to the rebels who routed government forces before withdrawing from Goma at the weekend under a ceasefire accord.
Rwanda and Uganda have strongly denied involvement in resource-rich North Kivue province. Neither country immediately commented on the new report into external backing for M23 as it forged out of its stronghold near the DR Congo border with Rwanda in early November.
At the start of the offensive, the DR Congo army killed more than 40 rebels and Rwandan Defense Force (RDF) soldiers "many of whom wore RDF uniforms and carried weapons used by the RDF," said the experts.
"When M23 progressed towards Goma on November 19, 2012, RDF units operated alongside M23 in combat at the airport and close to one of Goma's border posts into Rwanda," their report added.
Rwandan forces and rebels "together" took Goma, "marching through downtown dressed in a combination of RDF and new M23 uniforms."
The report quoted DR Congo army commanders and former Rwandan officers as saying that more than 1,000 Rwandan troops joined the M23 campaign and about 500 were inside Goma. They named RDF western commander General Emmanuel Ruvusha and M23 military chief Sultani Makenga as the joint heads of the campaign.
Uganda deployed troops near the DR Congo border at the end of October to make sure M23 territory "was not left unprotected during the imminent offensive."
The experts said they witnessed the delivery of hundreds of rain boots to the rebels at the Uganda-DR Congo border town of Bunagana on October 14.
The rebels also acquired camouflaged uniforms similar to those used by Rwandan forces. Former rebels and M23 members told the experts "the aim of using nearly indistinguishable uniforms was to create confusion" when RDF units joined the rebels.
The Security Council has already ordered sanctions against three M23 military commanders including Makenga. Last week the council passed a resolution which threatened action against "those providing external support" to the rebels.
The council called on Ban Ki-moon to provide a report on foreign backing for the rebels and the experts sent their letter as part of this.
Rwandan troops have repeatedly intervened in conflict across the border as part of more than a decade of war after 1998 which aid agencies say has caused more than five million deaths.
The UN experts said that a military monitoring mission from International Conference of the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) countries obtained "credible accounts" with photographs of Rwandan and Ugandan military assistance for the rebels when they went to border villages on November 1.
Rwandan officials refused to endorse the findings "and forced the other ICGLR members to weaken the text of the mission report," the experts said.
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