from government forces, in an unprecedented expansion of their reach in their years-long fighting.

Associated Press journalists witnessed scores of residents cheering on the M23 rebels in central Bukavu on Sunday morning as they walked and drove around the city centre after a daysl-ong march from the region’s major city of Goma, 63 miles (101 kilometres) away, which they captured late last month. Several parts of the city, however, remained deserted with residents indoors.

The M23 rebels are the most prominent of more than 100 armed groups vying for control of Congo’s mineral-rich east, and are supported by some 4,000 troops from neighbouring Rwanda, according to the UN. The fighting has displaced more than six million people in the region — the world’s largest humanitarian crisis — at least 350,000 of whom were left homeless after the rebels’ advance into Goma.

It was not clear if M23 had taken decisive control of the city of about 1.3 million people. The rebels were stationed at the South Kivu administrative office and in several other key locations in the city. There were no signs of fighting or of Congolese forces in most parts of Bukavu on Sunday.