By Simon Denyer
Nairobi - More than a quarter of a million people have fled their homes because of an upsurge in fighting in the east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo in the past two months, aid agencies said on Thursday.
Gangs of armed militias are roaming the forests of eastern Congo, preying on local people, even as the United Nations prepares a peacekeeping mission to the country, they said.
"Over the last two months we have seen a dramatic increase in the number of internally displaced," said Charles Petrie of the UN's Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Kigali, the Rwandan capital.
The number of people forced from their homes in the provinces of North and South Kivu alone had risen by 250 000 to around half a million in the last two months, Petrie said.
In the whole country more than a million people have fled their homes since war broke out in Congo in 1998.
UN figures show that less than 200 000 displaced people receive systematic assistance, and aid workers are talking about a humanitarian crisis.
"The displaced are dispersed within local communities and are barely surviving," Petrie told Reuters. "Malnutrition rates in the fields and health centres (of Kivu) are enormous."
Fighting has intensified in eastern Congo this year between Congolese rebels, backed by troops from Rwanda and Burundi, and local militias opposed to their presence in the country.
Congolese Mai Mai warriors are fighting the rebels beside remnants of the Interahamwe militias, Rwandan Hutu extremists who led Rwanda's 1994 genocide before fleeing into Congo.
Civilians often bear the brunt of the fighting as the militias loot and destroy their villages.
"The ability of the population to survive is already severely compromised (by years of fighting in the region)," Petrie said.
"On top of that you have these roving bands of armed elements, who also have to live off the land, and the way they survive is as predators living off the population."
Rwanda says its army is in Congo to counter the Interahamwe, and blames the Congolese government for arming them.
The government denies the charge, but local aid workers say the militias seem more organised in recent weeks, and now attack in bands of 300 or more, as opposed to groups of 30 or 40.
The UN Security Council voted last month to send 500 military observers, with 5 000 soldiers to protect them, into the Congo to monitor a shaky ceasefire deal across the country.
Although some observers could eventually be stationed in Kivu, the United Nations has no mandate to protect civilians actively or disarm the Interahamwe or other militias. - Reuters