26 killed in DR Congo attacks: Security monitor

By James Tasamba

KIGALI, Rwanda (AA) – At least 26 people have been killed in attacks in North Kivu province in the Democratic Republic of Congo by suspected Ugandan rebels of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a security monitor said Tuesday.

The killings occurred “on Friday and Saturday when armed militiamen raided the villages of Enebule and Misenge in Beni territory. The ADF are suspected,” said the Kivu Security Tracker, which maps violence in eastern DR Congo.

Civil society leaders in the village of Mamove called on the population Tuesday to be vigilant in the face of the “presence of the ADF” in several villages in the region.

Kinos Katuho, the head of the Mamove civil society group, warned that “the enemy is moving freely in several villages in the region killing and kidnapping civilians.”

Captain Anthony Mwalushayi, the Congolese army spokesman for Sokola 1 far north operations, confirmed the killings in Misenge, about 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) from Oicha, the capital of Beni territory, but calmed the population, saying the army has taken measures to secure the region.

Thousands of people in the two most conflict-affected eastern DR Congo provinces of North Kivu and Ituri live in camps.

Since October 2022, at least 1,334 people, including 107 children, have been killed in these eastern provinces, according to recent data released by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.

In late 2021, the Congolese and Ugandan militaries launched joint operations to flush out the ADF, which was founded in the 1990s by several opposition movements in Uganda to topple the government of Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni.

The group pledged allegiance to Islamic State in 2019.