The Congolese army regained a town west of Goma on Thursday hours after hundreds of people fled an outbreak of gunfire for fear of M23 rebel incursion.
Worried residents had left Sake earlier in the day, carrying their belongings along a 15-kilometre road to Goma, to avoid the fighting between the army and M23 rebels. The government accuses M23 of mass atrocities against civilians over the past year, M23 has continued to reject the claims.
The Congolese army did not comment about the shots, and the M23 did not respond to requests for comment either. The army and the rebels have been clashing north of Sake since Monday, according to Kivu Security Tracker, which maps unrest in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The Tutsi-led M23 staged a comeback in 2022, since they were chased into neighbouring Rwanda and Uganda in 2013.
The fighting has displaced thousands of civilians in Congo’s restless east despite military efforts to push back the rebels.
Battles erupted in November in the vicinity of Kibumba, located 20 km to the north of Goma, where rebels were supposed to have departed as part of a ceasefire agreement established by East African regional leaders a month later.