This, the intro to a photo gallery at In Focus on Rebel Attacks in Eastern Congo, seems to cover it pretty well:
For the past five months, a newly formed rebel group in the North Kivu Province of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) has been attacking government forces and seizing small towns, and it just took control of the city of Goma a week ago. The movement, called the March 23 Movement (M23), is made up of former members of previous rebel groups and is largely a continuation of hostilities in the region that date back to the First Congo War in 1996. Amid a complicated web of proxy battles, political posturing, defections, and re-defections, M23 rebel forces (purportedly supported by Rwanda) have fought fierce battles against DR Congo government troops and local Mai-Mai militias, sending civilians fleeing for shelter. UN peacekeeping forces in the region have not resisted the advances of the rebels, claiming their duty is to protect civilians, not to act as a substitute national army. Several hundred rebels, soldiers, and civilians have reportedly been killed, and many more wounded, so far. At the moment, M23 refuses to leave Goma and has a stated intention of overthrowing the national government.
The M23 rebels have now set out conditions for their withdrawal - conditions which seem designed for the government to reject.
Many of the pictures are of the by now all-too-familiar lines of desperate civilians streaming along the roads out of town clutching their belongings, as they flee from the fighting and the advance of the armed rebels.
This photo, though, could almost stand in for all the others:
[AP Photo/Marc Hofer]
"A Congolese man who lost his legs during 2008 fighting between government soldiers and a former rebel group sits on the ground with his prosthetic legs, near Goma's football stadium, on November 21, 2012. Thousands of Congolese soldiers and policemen defected to the M23 rebels, as rebel leaders vowed to take control of all Congo, including the capital Kinshasa."
How much determination, how much courage, must it take for this man to maintain his dignity in the face of overwhelming odds? - a smart jacket and tie, a freshly-ironed shirt - but here, finally, despair threatens to take over - yet still he looks, unblinking, into the camera lens...
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