Sawt Falasteen - Humanitarian situation in DRC's Goma 'extremely worrying': UN

Aid agencies warned that attacks on water and electricity infrastructure could fuel deadly infectious diseases like cholera, adding that fighting around a local laboratory could allow pathogens like Ebola to escape and spread.

"The humanitarian situation in and around Goma remains extremely worrying," Jens Laerke, spokesman for the United Nations' humanitarian agency OCHA, told reporters in Geneva.

He said UN colleagues were reporting "heavy small arms fire and mortar fire across the city, and the presence of many dead bodies in the streets".

The main city in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo has become a battleground since fighters from the Tutsi-led M23 armed group and Rwandan forces entered central Goma on Sunday night after a weeks-long advance through the region.

The lightning offensive marks a major escalation in the vast central African country's mineral-rich east, which has been by plagued by fighting between armed groups backed by regional rivals since the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

It has also triggered a spiralling humanitarian crisis, forcing half a million people from their homes since the start of the year, UN figures show.

- Rape, looting -

"Hundreds of thousands have been forced to flee multiple active conflict zones and the capacity to accommodate and assist those in need is saturated," Matthew Saltmarsh, spokesman for the UN refugee agency UNHCR, told reporters.

He lamented violent and deadly attacks targeting sites housing the displaced.

"Several sites on the outskirts of Goma, housing more than 300,000 displaced people, have been completely emptied within a few hours," he said.

Saltmarsh said UNHCR was "closely following cross-border movements" and was ready to respond and provide aid and protection.

Laerke highlighted "reports of gender-based violence and rape committed by fighters, looting of property, including humanitarian warehouses and humanitarian and health facilities being hit".

The UN's World Food Programme said some of its warehouses had been looted, adding it had "temporarily paused" food assistance amid safety concerns.

The looting shows "how desperate people are now", said Shelley Thakral, WFP's spokeswoman in DR Congo, voicing deep concern "about food scarcity in Goma".

Speaking to reporters in Geneva via video-link from Kinshasa, she said: "Depending on the duration of violence, the supply of food into the city could be severely hampered".

- Ebola risk -

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) also said its medical warehouse in Goma had been looted and had to be "urgently refurbished".

The organisation said it was meanwhile striving to help respond to a massive influx of wounded to Goma's "overwhelmed" hospitals, warning some patients were "lying on the floor due to lack of space".

And ICRC regional director for Africa Patrick Youssef voiced concern over the fighting around the national biomedical research institute's laboratory in Goma, stressing the importance of "preserving the samples that may be affected by the clashes".

It "could lead to unimaginable consequences if the (samples), including the Ebola virus, that it contains were to spread", he said.

The World Health Organization warned that "hospitals and health workers are in danger".

"We are hearing reports of health workers being shot at, and patients, including babies, being caught in the crossfire," WHO's emergency response coordinator for DR Congo, Adelheid Marschang, told reporters.

She warned that significant damage to infrastructure like water stations and electricity grids meant "conditions are rife for the spread of infectious diseases like cholera and measles".

The agencies called for a halt to the fighting.

The UN, Saltmarsh said, was calling "on all parties involved in the conflict to immediately respect international humanitarian law and prioritise civilian protection".

"The international community must step up efforts to support affected populations and facilitate long-term solutions to end the cycle of violence."

Y.Shaath--SF-PST