(Adds links between Ntaganda and Nkunda/Lubanga)

By Joe Bavier

GOMA, Congo, Jan 30 (Reuters) - A Congolese rebel leader who is wanted for war crimes but is helping lead a United Nations-backed military campaign should be arrested, a top European diplomat and rights campaigners said on Friday.

General Bosco Ntaganda is accused by prosecutors at the International Criminal Court (ICC) of crimes including recruiting children to fight an ethnic conflict in Democratic Republic of Congo's eastern district of Ituri.

Ntaganda, known as "The Terminator", is now a deputy commander of a joint military offensive by Congo and Rwanda aimed at rooting out Rwandan Hutu rebels, who are blamed for more than a decade of conflict in Africa's Great Lakes region.

"Given that he is indicted by the ICC, the European Union's position is that he should be brought to The Hague as soon as possible," Roland Van Der Geer, EU special envoy for the Great Lakes region, told journalists in the eastern city of Goma.

Ntaganda is a commander in the CNDP, a Tutsi rebel group founded by dissident general Laurent Nkunda. The CNDP split this month over Ntaganda's decision to back the joint offensive and Nkunda, also accused of war crimes, has been arrested by Rwanda.

Diplomats from the EU, Britain and France walked out of a ceremony attended by Ntaganda on Thursday to mark the start of the process meant to integrate over 6,000 of his fighters.

"We had informed the authorities that we could not remain there if Bosco came," Jean-Michel Dumont, the EU's special representative in Goma, told Reuters.

Ntaganda and his young, heavily armed rebel fighters are currently staying in an expensive lakeside Goma hotel that is frequented by diplomats and U.N. personnel.

A Congolese military spokesman confirmed Ntaganda had been named deputy commander for the operations, which get logistical support from Congo's U.N. peacekeeping mission, MONUC.

The U.N. said on Friday that thousands of people have fled their homes in the face of the military offensive ID:nLU212820].

LACK OF ACTION

In an abrupt turnaround in diplomatic relations between the two Great Lakes neighbours, former foes during a 1998-2003 war, Rwanda sent more than 3,500 soldiers across the border last week at the invitation of the Congolese government.

The pact to root out the Hutu rebel group Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) has been touted by both as an effort to end a lingering conflict and humanitarian disaster that has killed an estimated 5.4 million people since 1998.

Congo signed the Rome Statute creating the ICC, which obliges it to execute arrest warrants issued by the court. But Congo says government's first priority was to pacify its eastern borderlands.

"For us, there is no great difference between today and tomorrow. It's a question of time. We know that the problem exists," said Information Minister Lambert Mende.

New York-based rights group Human Rights Watch has criticised a lack of action by the international community to pressure Congo to arrest Ntaganda, who has appeared in public with government ministers and army commanders in recent weeks.

"MONUC has a mandate to promote justice. This is simply not something the United Nations should be part of," Anneke Van Woudenberg, a senior researcher with HRW, said of MONUC's role of giving logistical support.

While in Ituri, Ntaganda served as deputy military commander to another Congolese warlord, Thomas Lubanga, who became the first person to go on trial at the ICC on Monday. (Editing by Daniel Magnowski/David Lewis)

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