7,000 killed in fighting in DRC since January: PM Judith Suminwa Tuluka

About 7,000 people have died since January in fighting in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Prime Minister Judith Suminwa Tuluka told a high-level meeting of the Human Rights Council in Geneva on Monday.

About 4.5-million people are without shelter after 90 displacement camps were destroyed, she added.

The M23 rebels' advance is the gravest escalation in more than a decade of the long-running conflict in eastern DRC.

Rwanda rejects allegations from the DRC, UN and Western powers that it supports M23 with arms and troops.

The prime minister urged the world to act and to impose “dissuasive sanctions” amid mass displacements and summary executions. “It is impossible to describe the screams and cries of millions of victims of this conflict,” she added.

In opening remarks at the 58th UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, UN chief Antonio Guterres said human rights around the world are being “suffocated” and referred to horrifying human rights abuses in the DRC.