7 DR Congo soldiers sentenced to death for running from a fight against M23 rebels

A court in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo has sentenced seven soldiers to death for cowardice in the face of the enemy and murder.

The seven  were found to have fled advancing M23 rebels, retreating through the town of Sake where they killed two people by recklessly discharging their arms.

However, theLawyers for the soldiers said they would appeal the sentence.  

Last November, three other soldiers were convicted of cowardice and sentenced to death. In DR Congo death sentences are commuted to life imprisonment.

Fighting in the mineral-rich North Kivu province in the east of DRC has intensified, driving tens of thousands from their homes, despite a passionate appeal by Pope Francis to end conflicts when he visited the country last week.

"Hands off the Democratic Republic of the Congo! Hands off Africa! Stop choking Africa, it is not a mine to be stripped or a terrain to be plundered," Pope Francis said at a Mass in the capital Kinshasa, estimated to have been attended by a million people.

DR Congo has been beset by conflicts since its independence in the 1960s. Some have been driven by the fight to control its mineral wealth, others by ethnic rivalry.

There's been public anger against the UN force for failing to stop M23 rebels from capturing large swathes of territory in North Kivu.

According to Kivu Security Tracker, which maps unrest in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, the army and the M23 have been clashing north of Sake since Monday.

The Tutsi-led M23 staged a comeback last year after they were chased into neighbouring Rwanda and Uganda in 2013. The fighting has uprooted tens of thousands of civilians in Congo's restive east despite military efforts to push back M23.

Battles broke out in November around Kibumba, an area 20 kilometres north of Goma that rebels were meant to have left a month later as part of a ceasefire brokered by East African regional leaders.

But there has been evidence of M23 movements in places from which they were meant to withdraw as well as signs of advances in other areas, suggesting the offensive is ongoing.