Hutu rebels have retaken positions they lost in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, UN peacekeepers say. The UN says it has reports that FDLR rebels captured several villages and a former military training school, days after Rwandan troops began to withdraw.However, Congolese officials said the rebels made "hit-and-run" raids, denying it was a major regrouping.
Rwandan troops began withdrawing last Wednesday - five weeks after they crossed the border to attack the FDLR. In January, the government in Kinshasa allowed thousands of Rwandan soldiers to enter eastern DR Congo to fight the remnants of the Rwandan Hutu militia.
Some of the FDLR rebels are accused of taking part in the 1994 Rwandan genocide, before fleeing across the border into DR Congo.
In a separate development, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon - on a visit to Rwanda - said achieving peace peace in the volatile region depended on co-operation between the governments in Kinshasa and Kigali. He said he welcomed a plan by Rwanda's President Paul Kagame for the establishment of full diplomatic relations with DR Congo, speaking of his hope for a "new chapter" in relations between the two neighbours.
In eastern Dr Congo, however, a spokesman for the UN peacekeeping mission said on Sunday he had reports that the FDLR rebels had retaken several positions in the area. But Congolese Information Minister Lambert Mende Omalanga said the rebels were carrying out raids rather than moving back. "We didn't hear report that they are retaking the places. What our reports are saying is that they are conducting hit-and-run operations," the minister told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme.
"They [the rebels] don't remain in a place. When they come they loot, they frighten people and they take what they want to take and they go back because our boys are around."
The latest reports about the FDLR attacks will inevitably raise fears among Congolese civilians that their armed forces are failing to stand up to the rebels, the BBC's Mark Doyle reports from eastern DR Congo.