Rwanda-backed rebels claimed they captured eastern Congo’s largest city, Goma, early Monday, as the United Nations described a “mass panic” among its 2 million people and Congo’s government said the rebel advance was a “declaration of war.

Tens of thousands of people in the Democratic Republic of Congo are fleeing towns in the east of the country as rebel forces close in on the city of Goma. Explosions and gunshots were heard in city - home to more than a million people - late on Sunday evening,

Congo has severed diplomatic ties with Rwanda as fighting between Rwanda-backed rebels and government forces rages around the key eastern city of Goma, leaving at least 13 peacekeepers and foreign soldiers dead and displacing thousands of civilians.