Obasanjo, left, met Nkunda as part of an attempt to mediate between the CNDP and Kinshasa [AFP]

Laurent Nkunda, head of the National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP), said on Sunday that he will respect a ceasefire and ensure that humanitarian aid workers can reach refugees.

"Today is a great day for us because we were losing many men and now we have a message of peace. We should work with this mission," Nkunda said after meeting Olesegun Obasanjo, the UN envoy.

"We agreed to open humanitarian corridors to support the process."

Obasanjo told journalists after the talks in the rebel-held town of Jomba in North Kivu province: "I know now what he wants. I know that a ceasefire is like dancing tango, it cannot be done by one only."

The meeting came just hours after fresh fighting broke out between the CNDP and the DR Congo military.

"Heavy fighting broke out around 7am [05:00 GMT]" in Ndeko, a village close to the strategic town of Kanyabayonga, Lieutenant Colonel Jean-Paul Dietrich of Monuc, the UN mission in DR Congo, said.

Refugee crisis

More than 250,000 people have been displaced by fighting between the army and the CNDP, which claims to be acting in the interest of ethnic Tutsis in the region.

Thousands of Congolese civilians have fled their homes to avoid the fighting [EPA]

At least 100 people have been killed since fighting broke out in September, despite the presence of about 17,000 UN troops - the largest UN peacekeeping force in the world.

Kinshasa says that the CNDP is receiving assistance from neighbouring Rwanda, a claim that Kigali denies.

There are fears the country could slide into a ruinous war similar to the 1998-2002 conflict that drew in more than half a dozen African nations.

In the wake of that conflict, fighters backed by Uganda and Rwanda seized vast swaths of territory rich in coffee, gold and tin in the east.

Angola and Zimbabwe sent tanks and fighter planes to back DR Congo's government in exchange for access to lucrative diamond and copper mines to the south and west.

Eastern Congo has been unstable since millions of refugees spilled across the border from Rwanda's 1994 genocide, which saw more than 500,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus slaughtered.

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