By Joe Bavier

GOMA, Congo, Oct 20 (Reuters) - Thousands of civilians fled renewed fighting between Tutsi-dominated rebels and local militia in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo on Saturday, the country's U.N. peacekeeping mission said.

The two sides clashed before dawn near Bunagana, a town on Congo's border with Uganda that has been controlled by rebels loyal to renegade Tutsi General Laurent Nkunda since August.

Villagers from Bunagana and nearby settlements of Jomba, Runyoni and Bweza poured into Rutshuru, the government-held local administrative seat, around 8 a.m. (0600 GMT).

"What I saw was horrendous. It was raining. They didn't know where to go. Three women gave birth while they were fleeing," said Sylvie Van Den Wildenberg, spokeswoman in North Kivu province for the U.N. peacekeeping mission MONUC.

"The humanitarian consequences of whatever is happening there are very serious."

Around 370,000 people have already fled fighting between government soldiers, Nkunda loyalists, local militias and Rwandan Hutu rebels since the beginning of the year.

Congo's army has battled Nkunda since August when his men abandoned a January peace deal and pulled out of special mixed government brigades.

General Vainqueur Mayala, the army's top commander in North Kivu, said government forces were not involved in the fighting.

Nkunda's military spokesman Major Seraphin Mirindi said the rebels had been attacked by fighters from the Hutu-led Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR).

"They attacked us. Now our clean-up operations are under way. We're pushing them back, and they are losing many men," he told Reuters by telephone.

Nkunda led around 4,000 soldiers into the bush in 2004, saying he would protect Congo's Tutsi minority.

He accuses the government of supporting the FDLR, a Rwandan rebel group including ex-Hutu militia and Rwandan soldiers responsible for that country's 1994 genocide. The government denies this.

The head of the local Mai-Mai militia, which has carried out operations with the FDLR against Nkunda, said his forces near Bunagana had come under attack around 3 a.m. (0100 GMT).

Mai Mai leader, General Kasereka Kabamba, said the Mai Mai had taken control of Bunagana, a major town along Nkunda's supply route. There was no independent confirmation of this.

Following historic elections last year, President Joseph Kabila promised to pacify Congo's troubled east. In a press conference in North Kivu's provincial capital Goma on Wednesday, he said the army had received a green light to begin preparing military operations to disarm Nkunda's fighters.

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