Rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo have started withdrawing from two towns captured from government troops after a deal was brokered by Uganda.
The M23 group is giving up gains from a lightning offensive carried out in the past week, but there was no indication it was ending its eight-month-old insurgency.
The revolt against Congo's government has raised the risk of all-out war in a borderlands region dogged by nearly two decades of conflict that has killed about five million people and is fuelled by competition over mineral resources.
"We're leaving Sake, we're leaving Masisi," M23 military leader Sultani Makenga told reporters in rebel-held Goma, the provincial capital of North Kivu.
"Goma will be later," he said, adding fighters would eventually pull back 12 miles from the city.
Ugandan military chief Aronda Nyakayirima said on Tuesday that M23 had agreed to withdraw from Goma unconditionally. But M23's political leader Jean Marie Runiga initially cast doubt on the deal, saying the pull-out was contingent on a list of demands.
The rebels captured Goma last week after Congolese soldiers withdrew and UN peacekeepers gave up defending the city.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article