Fighters from an Islamist militia group have allegedly killed at least 17 people in a raid on a village in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo on Friday night, October 30.
The local authorities have blamed the aforementioned group for the deadly attack.
“Everything happened yesterday between 8 p.m. and midnight – the armed men carried out a raid,” local leader Kalunga Messo told Reuters by phone. “They killed our brothers without mercy.”
The army has confirmed the attack in the Buliki area of North Kivu province, but declined to give a death toll.
Reprisal attacks against civilians have rides significantly since the army began an operation against the ADF a year ago, dislodging it from several bases near the Ugandan border.
According to UN figures, the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a Ugandan armed group active in eastern Congo since the 1990s, has killed more than 1,000 civilians since the start of 2019.
The ADF is suspected of carrying out an attack on Wednesday in which 18 civilians were killed.
