Congolese Tutsi rebels were pulling back "in the hundreds" from frontline positions in North Kivu province in a gesture to support a United Nations peace initiative, a U.N. military spokesman said on Wednesday. "Since yesterday evening they have been withdrawing. They are pulling back south on three axes - from Kanyabayonga towards Kibirizi, from Kanyabayonga towards Nyanzale and from Rwindi south," Lt-Col Jean-Paul Dietrich told Reuters. He said U.N. peacekeepers were monitoring the pullback.