Panic spread in eastern Congo's main city on Thursday, with M23 rebels steadily inching closer to Goma and seizing a nearby town as they battle the Congolese army. Bombs were heard going off in the city's distant outskirts and hundreds of wounded civilians were brought in to the main hospital from the area of the fighting.

M23 is one of about 100 armed groups that have been vying for a foothold in mineral-rich eastern Congo, in a decades-long conflict that has created one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises.