Fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is driving 30,000 people into refugee camps near Goma, the provincial capital of the country's eastern province of North Kivu, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said yesterday.

In its statement, the UNHCR said that the refugees include 20,000 displaced from a camp in Kibumba, which is about 20 km north of Goma. They are temporarily taking shelter at Kibati, 10 km north of the provincial capital.

The rebel National Congress for People's Defense ( CNDP) continued their advance on Goma after overrunning the Rumangabo military base on Sunday before surging on Kibumba.

The 17,000-strong UN peacekeeping mission in the country, known as MONUC, used helicopter gunships to bomb the rebel forces north of Goma after being attacked by the rebel forces, the mission officials said.

On Monday, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned "the deliberate attacks" by the rebels on the UN peace mission, while appealing to the government and provincial authorities to "make every effort to restore calm."

The CNDP, led by renegade Tutsi general Laurent Nkunda, had clashed with government forces since August 2007. He says his aim is to defend the Tutsi ethnic minority in the DRC, which borders Rwanda.

The two sides signed a peace deal in Goma in January, agreeing to abide by a cease-fire, end hostility and restore peace.

Fighting resumed in August in North Kivu. The CNDP accuses the government of doing nothing to combat a Rwandese Hutu rebel group, the FDLR (Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda), whose elements were blamed for the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

The government denies the charges, saying it is determined to disarm and dislodge Rwandese Hutu rebels from the east of the country where they have been holed up since 1994.