According to Human Rights Watch, the army of the Democratic Republic of the Congo supported a known Rwandan Hutu rebel organization during recent fighting with the M23 militia.

The NGO said on Tuesday that the Congolese military had fought alongside and been armed by a coalition of militias accused of mistreatment.

Included in this was the FDLR, a Rwandan Hutu rebel organization located in the DRC that Kinshasa is frequently charged with assisting and which the Rwandan government regards as a threat.

The findings of Human Rights Watch come while relations between the two East African countries are extremely high.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has accused its smaller neighbor of supporting the M23 rebel organization, a mostly Congolese Tutsi militia that has seized large areas of land this year.

Rwanda rejects the assertion. However, according to a report by independent United Nations specialists obtained by AFP in August, Kigali had given the M23 direct support.

Human Rights Watch said on Tuesday that officers of the Congolese army had personally given direct assistance to a coalition of militias, including the FDLR, that fought the M23 between May and August.

For instance, the NGO said that army personnel gave FDLR fighters in Virunga National Park “more than a dozen boxes of ammunition.”