Bosco 'Terminator' Ntaganda takes over DR Congo towns

Troops loyal to Bosco Ntaganda, wanted by the International Criminal Court, have taken two towns in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

A BBC reporter in the area says thousands of people are fleeing the fierce fighting towards nearby Goma.

Hundreds of heavily armed soldiers loyal to Gen Ntaganda recently defected from the Congolese army.

Known locally as the Terminator, Gen Ntaganda has denied the ICC accusation that he recruited child soldiers.

'Counter-offensive'

The BBC's Thomas Hubert in Sake, 30km (18 miles) west of Goma, says local residents told him they heard the fighting between forces loyal to Gen Ntaganda and government troops going on well into Sunday night.

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Government soldiers were pushed out of the towns of Mushake and Karuba, our correspondent says, and have retreated 12km east to Sake, where they are regrouping for a counter-offensive.

The renegade soldiers, who deserted their Congolese army base in Goma earlier this month, number between 400-500, according to UN and Congolese military sources.

In another front of fighting, in the area of North Kivu province between Mweso and Kitchanga, Congolese army officials told our reporter that they had halted the progress of Gen Ntaganda's men.

Between 2002-2005, Gen Ntaganda was chief of military operations for the Congolese UCP rebels, led by warlord Thomas Lubanga - who in March was the first person to be convicted of war crimes by the ICC, after he was found guilty of recruiting child soldiers.

Gen Ntaganda was his co-accused - but President Joseph Kabila has previously refused to arrest him for the sake of DR Congo's peace.

In 2009 he and his rebel forces were integrated into the Congolese army, with him promoted to general.

The president earlier this month called for his arrest - but says he will not hand him over to the ICC.

Despite the end of DR Congo's war in 2003, several armed groups still roam the mineral-rich east of the country despite attempts by the UN and army to disarm them.

-BBC