By Evelyn Leopold

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 10 (Reuters) - The Security Council eased on Friday an arms embargo against the Congo government but left intact a provision forcing arms dealers to notify a U.N. sanctions panel of any weapons shipments.

The council has imposed a weapons ban on rebel groups in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and a travel ban and assets freeze on individual violators.

Friday's resolution allows the Congolese army to use arms in the violent eastern provinces of North and South Kivu as well as in Ituri for "technical training and assistance", which previously was prohibited. Integration of former rebel fighters into the national army has been patchy in the east.

At least 165,000 people have been uprooted in eastern areas of the central African country since January when the government and a renegade general, Laurent Nkunda, agreed to combine their troops but without success.

Under the sanctions regime, the United Nations Mission in the Congo, known as MONUC, is requested to monitor arms supplies which are to be delivered to a designated receiving point. This provision was left intact along with a requirement that nations delivering weapons to Congo first notify a council sanctions committee.

In a letter to the council, the Kinshasa government asked for an easing of the embargo in the east, a request supported by the United States. U.S. envoys also wanted the removal of a requirement that the council's Congo sanctions committee be notified in advance of all shipments to the government, diplomats said.

But Belgium, the former colonial power, as well as other council members urged caution and were concerned that newly integrated rebel soldiers into the Congolese army had often proved unreliable and were committing atrocities.

Congo had also questioned reports by a panel of experts, which surveys violations of the arms embargo as well as illegal exploitation of natural resources. The new resolution renews the experts' mandate but asks for one instead of two reports a year.

Congo houses the largest U.N. peacekeeping mission, with more than 17,000 troops, but rebels, renegades and undisciplined army soldiers still terrorize civilians in the east of the country long after the end of a 1998-to-2003 war.

The weapons ban was first imposed in mid-2003 and expanded in subsequent years.

Despite successful polls last year that resulted in Joseph Kabila becoming Congo's first democratically elected president in over 40 years, fears are growing of a return to war in the eastern regions.

The Kinshasa government ackknowledged on Thursday its soldiers had opened fire on a boat operated by Heritage Oil Corp last week, killing a British contractor.

Congo's Oil Minister Lambert Mende said the army was returning fire and accused Heritage of carrying out illegal exploration in its half of Lake Albert, which it shares with Uganda.

(Additional reporting by Joe Bavier in Kinshasa)

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