Clashes intensify in remote east Congo, challenging US mediation

Wilondja Mukula, a member of the Wazalendo militia sits with other patients after the treatment of a bullet wound at the Fizi General Referral Hospital supported by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), in Fizi territory of South Kivu province, in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo January 28, 2026. REUTERS/Gradel Muyisa Mumbere

Feb 6 (Reuters) - Nurses at the general hospital in Fizi, ‌a town ringed by steep highlands in eastern Congo’s South Kivu province, hurried the wounded soldier into surgery after he was ‌brought in slumped on the back of a motorbike.

He was shot in both legs on the front line in the mountains ‌north of town, where clashes between the army and rebel groups havesurged in recent weeks.