DRC: ADF blamed for a new attack that claimed more than 40 lives

More than 40 people were killed in a new attack on the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo on Wednesday night, according to local authorities. The ADF rebels, who are associated with the Islamic State organization, were blamed for the attack.

The head of the local grouping (set of villages), Kalunga Meso, told AFP that the death toll from two nearby villages in the territory of Beni, in the province of North Kivu, was 38 in Mukondi and eight in Mausa.

Assailants “entered the village Mukondi quietly” and killed the majority of the victims “with knives,” according to Arsène Mumbere, president of the local civil society, who also confirmed this death toll.

The ADF, originally Muslim-majority rebels from Uganda, have been active in eastern DRC since the mid-1990s and have been charged with massacring thousands of civilians.

A joint military operation between the Congolese and Ugandan armies was launched in 2021 to hunt them down in North Kivu and the neighboring Ituri province after attacks on Ugandan soil were also attributed to them.

Last week, the US offered a reward of up to $5 million for information leading to their leader, a Musa Baluku, a Ugandan man in his 40s.