Red Cross staff load bodies onto a lorry bound for the morgue of the hospital in the north of Goma.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy replaced the commander of the eastern front, the most heated battlefield of the Ukraine war, after Russian forces captured another strategic town there.

Ukraine is deeply concerned about the escalation of hostilities in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Rebels, supported by Rwanda, have entered the largest city in the eastern region, according to the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Missiles are flying above civilians' homes as fighters fire heavy artillery in Goma's city centre, an International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) spokesperson tells the BBC. "It is a very densely populated area... there are lots of victims in terms of civilians, Myriam Favier says.

President of the Democratic Republic of Congo said on Thursday that his troopers are fighting an insurgence by the Rwandan-backed militant group M23 which recently captured swaths of land in the east.

Ukraine's foreign ministry summoned Slovakia's ambassador in Kyiv on Thursday to reject accusations that it is meddling in its neighbour's internal affairs and to accuse Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico of being a "mouthpiece" for Russia.

The Rwanda-backed M23 group is one of about 100 armed factions vying for a foothold in eastern Congo in one of Africa’s longest conflicts, displacing 4.5 million people and creating what the U.N. called “one of the most protracted, complex, serious humanitarian crises on Earth."

The scene is the result of the invasion of Goma on January 27th by M23, an armed group under the control of Rwanda, Congo’s neighbour, which abuts the city. Paul Kagame, Rwanda’s president, has escalated a crisis whose origins go back decades.

A rebel alliance claimed the capture of the biggest city in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s mineral-rich eastern region this week, pushing back against resistance from government troops backed by regional and UN intervention forces.

The Red Cross voiced alarm Tuesday over the risk that fighting in the besieged DR Congo city of Goma could cause samples of Ebola and other pathogens held in a laboratory to escape. The International Committee of the Red Cross is "very concerned about the situation in the laboratory of the national biomedical research institute,

This photo gallery, curated by photo editor Patrick Sison, highlights some of the most compelling images worldwide made or published by The Associated Press in the past week.

On the shores of Lake Kivu, Goma residents were busy filling up plastic jerrycans with lake water. Less than a week since Rwanda-backed rebels claimed control of the city, basic services like water, internet and electricity were completely cut off.