UNITED NATIONS  - Rebels in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo are carrying out “summary executions” of local leaders as they take new territory, a UN envoy said Wednesday. The UN Security Council held urgent new talks on the growing crisis in DR Congo as the United Nations finally published a widely-leaked report which said Rwanda has given heavy backing to the M23 rebels. M23 have expanded their list of demands and are now making “offensive moves” from the captured provincial capital toward government forces, UN envoy to DR Congo Roger Meece told the Security Council. The army moved back to the small town of Sake after giving up Goma on Tuesday.
Sake is about 27 kilometers (17 miles) from the North Kivu province capital and some reports said the rebels have already overrun Sake. Meece said the rebels are trying to set up “a formal administrative or governing structure” in the territory they now control. “We have received numerous reports of targeted summary executions of those who stand in their way, including government and traditional leaders who resist or fail to cooperate with an M23 administrative structure,” he said. Meece said the insurgents had also been accused of recruiting child soldiers and rapes of women and children. Since the fall of Goma there have been demonstrations in several Congo cities against the UN presence and the government and Meece said he feared these could spread. The M23 rebels have said they will march on the capital Kinshasa. The group, which is led by at least one wanted war criminal, launched their rebellion in April. Meece spoke to the council as the United Nations finally released a report by UN sanctions committee experts who said Rwanda has backed the rebels with guns and troops, while Uganda had also provided aid.