Alan Doss, the head of the United Nations' peacekeeping mission in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, has said there's a real prospect of peace after years of conflict.
Doss told the UN Security Council there has been progress towards peace on a number of fronts in the past year.
However, earlier in the week a coalition of humanitarian groups claimed UN troops weren't doing enough to protect civilians and that Rwandan Hutu militiamen and Congolese forces have killed more than one thousand and displaced nearly 900 thousand others this year.
Al Jazeera's Mohammed Adow in Goma has been speaking to some of those civilian victims and sent this exclusive report.
