By Joe Bavier

MUGUNGA, Congo, Sept 11 (Reuters) - When Congolese Tutsi fighters led by a renegade general attacked the eastern town of Sake last week, 35-year-old Mutoka Kakomire and thousands more non-Tutsis fled with whatever he could carry.

"It was war ... They want to kill us," he said.

Kakomire fled to the safety of government lines before a U.N.-brokered truce halted the clashes that threatened once again to tear apart the volatile mix of ethnic groups living in east Democratic Republic of Congo.

Human rights groups fear the latest violence, whose origins lie in neighbouring Rwanda's 1994 genocide and Congo's own 1998-2003 war, will polarise communities among tribal lines and lead to even more ethnic slaughter.

The shaky ceasefire in North Kivu province between Congo's government army and Tutsi soldiers loyal to rebel General Laurent Nkunda appeared to be holding this week after nearly two weeks of fighting that killed dozens on both sides.

But analysts fear the absence of political negotiations means it could easily flare again, threatening to touch off wider conflict in a Great Lakes region that is a tinderbox of wars, border disputes and ethnic hatred.

"The big problem of significance right now is the increase of ethnic tensions," Anneke Van Woudenberg, a Congo researcher with New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW), told Reuters.

"This current situation is only feeding it even more. And it's dangerous for the long term," she added.

Nkunda says he is fighting to protect his Tutsi people in east Congo against attacks by largely Hutu Rwandan FDLR rebels accused of involvement in Rwanda's 1994 genocide, in which 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slain.

Rwanda has pressed Congo's President Joseph Kabila to expel the rebel FDLR (Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda), who backed Kinshasa during the most recent war.

Nkunda accuses Kabila's government of directly supporting the FDLR insurgents, who are blamed for repeated murders and rapes across eastern Congo.

MANIPULATION AND DISCRIMINATION

"Nkunda's alleged defensive acts on behalf of the Tutsis have actually fanned the flames of anti-Tutsi hatred, even though his own community sees him as a protector," said Jason Stearns, an independent analyst of central Africa.

"But ... there are individuals on both sides manipulating these ethnic tensions for their personal ambitions," he added.

At Kichanga, on the rebel side of the North Kivu battleground, several hundred recently displaced Tutsis have fled to one of Nkunda's principle strongholds.

Eugenie Muronunkwere and her five children left their home last week in fear of an assault by the FDLR.

"Nkunda's troops protect us. The government soldiers are only there to rob us. They discriminate against us," she said.

U.K.-based Amnesty International warned the recent violence could spawn fresh ethnic massacres and other abuses and said it was already receiving reports of rapes and killings of civilians and renewed recruitment of child soldiers.

A Rwandan-brokered peace deal signed by Nkunda with Kabila's government in January began reintegrating thousands of his Tutsi fighters into special mixed brigades of the national army. It was hoped this would help to pacify North Kivu after Congo's nationwide elections last year, which Kabila won.

But the brigades dominated by Nkunda's Tutsis unleashed a campaign of terror against civilians they suspected of collaborating with their old enemy, the FDLR.

When Congolese army commanders announced the suspension of operations against the FDLR last month, intending to replace the mixed brigades with regular army forces, Nkunda's soldiers deserted in droves and went back to the bush with their weapons.

"Inevitably, if you've got ethnic groups self-selecting where they are going to live, its only going to create more land disputes, more ethnic hatred in an area where weapons are still buried in the back yard," Van Woudenberg said.

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