The UN Envoy for Africa's Great Lakes Region on Tuesday called for implementation of framework agreement for the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), while voicing concerns over renewed clashes in the country's eastern areas.

Mary Robinson, the UN Secretary-General's Special Envoy for the Great Lakes Region of Africa, expressed her concern about the recent outbreak of fighting in locations near Goma, in eastern DRC, said deputy UN spokesman Eduardo del Buey at a daily news briefing held at the UN headquarters in New York.

Robinson urged the DRC and all other parties to implement their commitments under a recently adopted framework agreement with a focus on a peaceful resolution to the crisis in the eastern DRC and the region, del Buey said.

Fighting between rebels from the 23 March Movement (M23) and the Congolese Armed Forces (FARDC) broke out again Monday in Kibati and Rusayo, some 12 kilometers from Goma, according to a report of the UN Stabilization Mission in the DRC (MONUSCO).

MONUSCO said Tuesday that the fighting had resumed in Mutaho, 12 km from Goma, for the second day, while calling for restraint and continuing the efforts to seek de-escalation of the situation.

During his visit to Mozambique, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki- moon said that the latest clashes showed how urgent it was to implement the framework agreement for the DRC and the African Great Lakes region.

Robinson will be joining Ban and World Bank President Jim Yong Kim on their upcoming joint visit to the DRC, Rwanda and Uganda from May 22-24 to support the implementation of the Peace, Security and Cooperation Framework for the DRC and the region.

The UN-brokered Framework was adopted in February in Addis Ababa, the national capital of Ethiopia, with the support of 11 African nations and four international organizations (11+4), and aims to end the cycles of conflict and crisis in the eastern DRC and to build peace in the long-troubled region.

"The suffering and displacement of the people, especially women and children, in eastern DRC and beyond have gone on for too long and cannot be tolerated any further," del Buey said, quoting Robinson as saying.

Tensions have been heightened in the region recently as the M23 publicly decried the deployment of an intervention brigade within MONUSCO and broke off the so-called Kampala peace talks with the DRC government. The deployment of an intervention brigade within MONUSCO was authorized by the UN Security Council in March to carry out targeted offensive operations, with or without the Congolese national army, against armed groups that threaten peace in the eastern DRC.

Since late April, the M23 rebels have threatened to attack Goma and other towns in the North Kivu province, claiming that they are ready to attack the UN intervention force in case it attacks their bases.