Nairobi/Goma  - A rebel group that has been battling government forces in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo said Tuesday it would withdraw from two fronts to show its commitment to peace.

Rebel Tutsi general Laurent Nkunda's National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP) has routed the Congolese army and seized control of territory in the eastern North Kivu province in recent weeks.

The CNDP said in a statement on its website it had decided to "immediately and unilaterally" withdraw its troops a distance of 40 kilometres on the Kanyabayonga-Nyanzale and Kabasha-Kiwanja fronts in North Kivu.

"It is a question of creating zones of separation which will be occupied only by (UN peacekeeping force in DR Congo) MONUC to the exclusion of other forces," the rebel statement read.

However, MONUC is overstretched and the head of the mission Alan Doss has called for more troops.

France on Monday presented a draft resolution to the UN Security Council calling for 3,000 more soldiers. The motion is expected to go the vote next week.

General Bipin Rawat, who commands 6,000 peacekeeping troops in the DR Congo, said that the rules of engagement and not the number of soldiers were the biggest problem.

He told the Britain's Daily Telegraph that because UN peacekeepers had to drive white armoured vehicles and had to fire warning shots they could not use the element of surprise.

Aid agencies say that renewed fighting between the CNDP and government forces has displaced at least 250,000 people since late August, creating a humanitarian emergency.

It has been difficult to deliver food to civilians caught behind rebel lines due to the security situation, but the buffer zone should ease the movement of aid convoys if it is created.

The CNDP's move comes after Nkunda on Sunday told UN peace envoy Olusegun Obasanjo, the former president of Nigeria, that he would stick to a ceasefire and support a UN-backed peace process.

Nkunda called a ceasefire almost three weeks ago as his troops were on the verge of taking Goma, the capital of North Kivu, but fighting has continued. Some of the worst clashes in a week took place as Nkunda and Obasanjo met.

The withdrawal follows the sacking of the Congolese military chief of staff in the wake of the rebel gains.

State television late Monday night said that General Didier Etumba Longomba, the navy chief, would take over from General Dieudonne Kayembe.

Army discipline has broken down in many cases, with Congolese troops looting and raping as they retreated in disarray. Longomba will be handed the formidable task of moulding the army into a cohesive fighting force.

Nkunda has warned that unless the government talks to him, his forces - believed to number between 4,000 and 6,000 - will brush aside the Congolese army and march on the capital Kinshasa.

Nkunda was left out of talks in Nairobi on November 7, which were attended by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, Congolese President Joseph Kabila and Rwandan President Paul Kagame.

However, Obasanjo said he hopes to broker talks between Kabila and Nkunda in the coming weeks.

There are fears that the fighting could reignite the 1998-2003 war, which sucked in many other nations, including Angola, Rwanda and Zimbabwe.

More than 5 million people are estimated to have died as a result of the five-year conflict in the resource-rich nation, most of them from hunger and disease.

The DR Congo accuses Rwanda of backing Nkunda, who says he is fighting to protect Tutsis from Hutu militia.

The armed Hutu groups were implicated in the 1994 massacres in Rwanda, when 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed. The Hutus fled to DR Congo after Tutsis forces led by Kagame seized power.

However, many observers say that the ethnic dimension is merely a pretext for various militia to seize control of land rich in gold, tin and coltan, which is widely used in electronic devices. (dpa)