A court in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo has sentenced seven soldiers to death for cowardice in the face of the enemy and murder.

They were found to have fled advancing M23 rebels, retreating through the town of Sake where they caused the death of two people by recklessly discharging their arms.

Their lawyers plan to appeal.

Last November, three other soldiers were convicted of cowardice and sentenced to death. In DR Congo death sentences are commuted to life imprisonment.

Fighting in the mineral-rich North Kivu province has intensified, driving tens of thousands from their homes, despite a passionate appeal by Pope Francis to end conflicts when he visited the country last week.

“Hands off the Democratic Republic of the Congo! Hands off Africa! Stop choking Africa, it is not a mine to be stripped or a terrain to be plundered,” Pope Francis said at a Mass in the capital Kinshasa, estimated to have been attended by a million people.

DR Congo has been beset by conflicts since its independence in the 1960s. Some have been driven by the fight to control its mineral wealth, others by ethnic rivalry.

There’s been public anger against the UN and the East African regional force for failing to stop M23 rebels from capturing large swathes of territory in North Kivu. DR Congo, the US and UN experts accuse neighbouring Rwanda of backing the rebels – a claim it denies.

Rwanda has for many years criticised the Congolese authorities for failing to disarm Hutu rebels – some of whom were linked to the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

Former Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta on Thursday asked countries in the East African Community to fully deploy troops to the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Speaking after the EAC’s extra-ordinary Summit in Bujumbura, Kenyatta, the EAC facilitator of the EAC-led peace process in the Congo, said the troops should help buffer liberated areas in eastern DRC from a clash between government forces and rebels.

“The Facilitator urges the countries of the East African Community Regional Force (EACRF) to deploy and take up their positions urgently and without further delay throughout eastern DRC, and in the case of North Kivu, for the regional force to inter-pose itself between the fighting forces in areas where the withdrawal of the armed groups has been effected,” Kenyatta said in a statement.

He did not attend the Summit in Bujumbura last Saturday, citing logistical problems and a short notice. But Kenyatta said he endorsed the decisions by leaders of the East African Community who asked for a ceasefire, rebels to withdraw and for defence chiefs to decide new timelines for withdrawal of rebels.

The call for deployment, however, may imply his fervent support for the EACRF, authorised last year to be the EAC mission in the DR Congo to help bring peace.

– Agencies