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D.R.Congo: Leader of M23 movement surrenders in Uganda
“We have roughly about 1,500 M23 combatants who surrendered to us. We have disarmed all of them and we’re in the process of documenting and categorizing all their weapons,” said Captain Ronald Kakurungu, army spokesperson for Uganda’s Western region.
That number of 1,500 is higher than most previous estimates of the strength of the M23, which experts had generally believed to have dwindled in recent months to a few hundred.
The M23, initially launched its campaign when it said a peace deal with another Tutsi-led group had not been honored by the Congolese government.
Diplomats at the United Nations said the Congolese army and 3,000-strong combined African Union and U.N. intervention force could now turn their attention to other groups in the D.R. Congo’s east.
Millions of people have died from violence, disease and hunger since the 1990s as dozens of rebel groups have fought for control of eastern Congo’s rich deposits of gold, diamonds, copper, cobalt and uranium.
Source: Reuters, Newswires
