KAMPALA, Uganda, Nov. 12 (UPI) -- The Democratic Republic of Congo rejected a peace agreement Tuesday with M23 rebels on the grounds the group has disbanded.
The agreement was brokered by Uganda and a ceremony had been scheduled there, The Wall Street Journal reported. A Ugandan spokesman, Ofwono Opondo, accused the DRC of "last-minute demands and delaying tactics."
About 2,000 rebels from the eastern DRC are now in Uganda. M23 and other groups have been fighting in North Kivu, an area rich in minerals, for months, but United Nations peacekeepers effectively drove M23 out of the country.
The agreement would have allowed M23 fighters to join the DRC army and the group to convert to a political party.
"We cannot sign a peace deal with a disbanded group," Lambert Mende, the DRC's minister of information, said.
Mende suggested Uganda acts like it is part of M23.
