Al Jazeera Podcasts.

Today, Eastern DRC's largest city is under siege as Rwandan-backed rebels close in.

Columns of M23's fighters enter the city of Goma, hours after the armed group said it had

taken control. M23 has declared the airspace of a Goma closed. In other words, we are trapped.

Why is Rwand involved and what does it want?

I'm Kevin Hurtan and this is the take.

My name is Kambalim Safuli. I am the spokesperson and a policy analyst with the Center for Research on

the Congo. I am Congolese, and I am currently in Akragan.

Kamali, it's great to have you on the take. I wonder if we can start by just locating this

conversation a bit. We're talking about Goma, which is the largest city in the east of the Democratic Republic

of Congo.

For someone who is hearing the name Goma for the first time, why is this city so significant

for the region and why is it being fought over so fiercely?

So Goma, as you pointed out, is the city in the eastern part of the DRC.

It's the capital city of North Kivu.

North Kivu is one of the province of the Congo, and Congo is right in the center of Africa.

So if you open the map of Africa, you put where, you see what the Congo is.

It straddles the equator and it's the size of Western Europe.

And it's strategically placed in a way where you can get to north, south, east, and west of Africa much faster.

And Goma is a capital city that's close to the eastern trade routes,

to shiftings toward Kenya, toward Tanzania, and so on,

to find its way to China or Japan or India even.

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