M23 Rebels Announce Withdrawal From Frontline in Eastern DRC

Have been fighting United Nations and Congolese forces

The M23 rebel movement in the Democratic Republic of Congo will be withdrawing troops from the frontline of fighting with Congolese and UN forces, according to the group's chief.

Bertrand Bisimwa, the civilian president of M23, told Al Jazeera on Friday that his troops were withdrawing in order to allow what he called independent verifiers to enter the area of the battle to assess where shells had fallen in the nearby city of Goma and across the border in Rwanda.

He denied that his troops were withdrawing because of battlefield casualties, an assertion that the government made.