Uganda is backing M23 rebels fighting across its border in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, UN experts say, warning that a rapidly escalating crisis \u201ccarried the risk of triggering a wider regional conflict\u201d.<\/p>\n
The well-armed M23 is often accused of being a Rwandan proxy force, but the UN experts have put forward evidence to suggest that it also has Uganda\u2019s support.<\/p>\n
Uganda has denied the allegations in the UN report that also accuses Rwanda of having up to 4,000 troops in DR Congo fighting alongside the rebels.<\/p>\n
In response, Rwanda did not deny the allegation and told the BBC the DR Congo government lacked the political will to resolve the crisis in its mineral-rich east, which has witnessed decades of unrest.<\/p>\n
The UN experts said that Rwandan troops were “matching if not surpassing” the number of M23 fighters, thought to be at around 3,000 in mid-April, on Congolese soil.<\/p>\n
Rwanda has long been angered by the presence of ethnic Hutu rebels, known as the FDLR, in eastern DR Congo – joint operations in the past have failed to eliminate them.<\/p>\n
The group\u2019s leaders are accused of taking part in the 1994 Rwandan genocide, in which 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed.<\/p>\n
The Tutsi-led M23 first emerged with great ferocity in 2012, only to be defeated the following year with the help of a multinational force when most of its fighters fled to camps in Rwanda and Uganda.<\/p>\n
They began to rearm three years ago and the group now controls swathes of territory in the North Kivu province, where the UN report says M23 has installed a parallel administration.<\/p>\n
Three million people are estimated to have fled their homes because of the fighting.<\/p>\n