Fierce fighting rages on in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo city of Goma, as rebels and the army exchange fire.
“All we can hear [are] gunshots around the city,” one Goma resident, who has been trapped in his house since the weekend, told the BBC.
Residents shared videos of M23 rebels patrolling Goma’s main streets following Sunday’s lightning advance against the Congolese army that saw tens of thousands of people fleeing neighbouring towns.
The rebels say they are in control of the city but the Congolese authorities dispute this.
Prosper, a local journalist in Goma, told the BBC there were clashes between the army and the rebels in parts of the city. “We’re really worried,” he said.
The M23 has taken control of the Goma branch of state broadcaster RTNC, according to the UN-sponsored Radio Okapi.
One Goma resident, Lucie, told AFP she was hiding in her bed because she was terrified.
“We can hear the shooting outside our homes. We cannot leave.”
AFP has reported that at least 17 people have been killed in the fighting and over 300 injured.
This swift advance comes hours after DR Congo’s foreign minister accused neighbouring Rwanda of declaring war by sending its troops over the border to support the M23.
Rwanda does not deny backing the M23 but accuses the Congolese authorities of supporting militias trying to topple the government in Kigali.
Kenya’s President William Ruto, the current chair of the East African Community, has called for a ceasefire, and announced that the presidents of both the DR Congo and Rwanda will attend an emergency regional summit on Wednesday.
President Ruto said it was incumbent on regional leaders to help facilitate a peaceful solution to the conflict.
Amid the escalating clashes in Goma, Rwanda has also been hit.
Five civilians had been killed and 25 seriously injured in the town of Gisenyi, just across the border from Goma, a Rwandan military spokesperson told the AFP news agency.
The M23 group has taken control of vast parts of mineral-rich eastern DR Congo since 2021. In the past few weeks, the group has been advancing swiftly on Goma amid intense fighting.
Since the start of 2025 more than 400,000 people have been forced from their homes in the provinces of North and South Kivu, according to the UN’s refugee agency.
One woman, Alice Feza, said she was at a loss about what to do next, as this was the fourth time she had had to run away from the M23 advance.
“People are fleeing everywhere, and we don’t know where to go any more, because we started fleeing a long time ago,” Ms Feza said, adding: “The war catches us here among the host families, now we have nowhere to go.”
Key roads surrounding Goma are blocked and the city’s airport can no longer be used for evacuation and humanitarian efforts, the UN has said.
Following the M23 claims that it had seized the city, the government said its forces were still controlling strategic areas, including the airport.
“Contrary to the manipulative messages circulating on social networks the FARDC [the DR Congo army] hold the Goma airport… and all the strategic points of the capital of the North Kivu Province,” it said in a statement early on Monday morning.
It added that the army was “more than determined to defend the homeland at the cost of the supreme sacrifice”.
A resident told the Reuters news agency that there was “confusion in the city; here near the airport, we see soldiers. I have not seen the M23 yet”, adding that there were also some cases of looting of shops.
Reverend Damiri, chaplain of the HEAL Africa hospital in Goma, told the BBC that it was calm where he was, although he could hear gunshots from another side of the city.
“Goma is a large city… We still have quite a number of soldiers that have gathered together, governmental soldiers, but a big part of the city is controlled by the rebels,” he said.
There have been reports of heavy artillery hitting the centre of Goma, and of a mass escape from a prison in the city, with unverified videos being shared online appearing to show prisoners fleeing.
A security source told the AFP news agency that the prison holding 3,000 inmates was “totally torched” and that the jailbreak had resulted in deaths.
Power and water has reportedly been cut to many areas of the city.
The rebels had ordered soldiers to surrender their weapons and imposed a 48-hour deadline that ended early on Monday.
UN peacekeepers said that some Congolese soldiers had surrendered their firearms with them before the deadline.
UN Secretary General António Guterres has called on Rwanda to withdraw its forces from the DR Congo’s territory and on the M23 to stop its advance.
This comes after 13 soldiers serving with peacekeeping forces were killed in clashes with the rebels.
Both DR Congo and the UN say the M23 group is backed by Rwanda.
Speaking at the Security Council meeting, Rwanda’s UN representative Ernest Rwamucyo said he regretted that the international community had chosen to condemn the M23 group rather than the Congolese army, which, he said, had violated a ceasefire.
On Saturday, the UN said it would be pulling all of its non-essential staff out of Goma.
