TROOPS SENT TO QUELL REBELS

The Democratic Republic of Congo has sent troop reinforcements to try and put down a rebellion in the east.
The government has also ordered rebels loyal to a renegade general to lay down their arms and go to training centres of the national army.
The call came shortly after the rebel soldiers allied to General Laurent Nkunda attacked government troops in the troubled North Kivu province.
Thousands of people have fled their homes since the clashes intensified.
A UN military spokesman confirmed that the government troops are being sent on Monuc helicopters to an area near Katale, the headquarters of the brigade that was stormed by General Laurent Nkunda's rebel soldiers on Thursday.
Since Monday, hundreds of rebel troops loyal to the ethnic Tutsi general have launched three attacks.
The BBC's Arnaud Zajtman in Kinshasa says witnesses at the airport in the eastern regional capital Goma have seen the government troop reinforcements flying in.

IN PICTURES

Elusive peace in east Congo

DR Congo Defence Minister Tshikez Djemu said late on Thursday that if the former rebels refused to lay down their arms, they would be considered bandits and be dealt with accordingly by the army.
Tension is nothing new to North Kivu but it has suddenly increased after the government's decision to dismantle what are known as the mixed brigades, our correspondent says.
These brigades, created earlier this year, were made up of government soldiers and more than 7,000 former rebels.
They joined the brigades on condition that they would remain deployed as a group to protect their own community, the Tutsis, against Rwandan Hutu rebels, some of whom took part in the 1994 genocide of Tutsis.
But since the beginning of this year, military operations launched by the mixed brigades against the Hutu rebels have created more instability and the UN says more than 170,000 civilians have been displaced.
Mr Djemu said the mixed brigades would now be dismantled and the former Tutsi rebels deployed to other parts of DR Congo.
But so far most of those rebels have refused to lay down their arms or to leave the protection of their community to other units of the Congolese army, our correspondent says.
Last year's historic elections, which saw Joseph Kabila elected president, were supposed to mark the end of years of conflict and mismanagement in DR Congo.

BBC NEWS REPORT.