There has been a major battle in eastern Chad, with continuing heavy fighting, a rebel group says. The Rally of Forces for Change (RFC) says government forces attacked them at dawn 150km north of the town of Abeche. No casualty figures were given. The latest clashes come 24 hours after the rebels seized a number of army officers and vehicles. President Idriss Deby is reportedly on the ground in eastern Chad commanding his troops. His army is fighting on two separate fronts: to the south of the current battles with the RFC (led by the president's uncle, Timane Erdimi) at Biltine, they have also been engaging the better-equipped fighters of Mahamat Nouri's Union of Forces for Democracy and Development (UFDD). The UN's refugee agency says it is concerned about the latest fighting and its impact on the camps in the region.
A major battle with the UFDD at Abou Goulem a week ago left hundreds dead and the army said it had chased the remnants of the unit across the border. The UN also warns that two other rebel groups - who along with the RFC and UFDD, signed a Libyan-brokered ceasefire a month ago - are also poised to re-enter combat. Soldiers from recently-ousted Defence Minister Mahamat Nour Abdelkarim's United Front for Change (FUC), who had been integrating into the national army, are reportedly defecting en masse from at least two garrisons, at Adre and Guereda. And negotiations with a fourth rebel group, the Chadian National Concord (CNT) have also broken down, the UN says, with the CNT forces poised to attack Daguessa from their bases inside Sudan. The rebels accuse Mr Deby of being a "tyrant" and favouring members of his Zagawa community.