Allied Democratic Forces rebels with machetes and guns killed more than 50 civilians at a funeral in east Congo, the latest big attack by the ISIS-linked group, officials said.<\/p>\n
The ADF assault took place on Monday night in the town of Ntoyo in North Kivu province’s Lubero territory, said Macaire Sivikunula, a local administrator.<\/p>\n
“I can confirm a provisional death toll of 50. The victims were caught off guard at a mourning ceremony in the village of Ntoyo at around 9 p.m., and most of them were killed with machetes,” he said. “The search is continuing.”<\/p>\n
The ADF started as an uprising in Uganda but has been based in neighbouring Congo since the late 1990s, recognised by the Islamic State militant group as an affiliate.<\/p>\n
A recent flurry of ADF attacks has added to insecurity in east Congo, a mineral-rich region where Rwanda-backed M23 rebels staged a major advance earlier this year, prompting U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration to try to broker peace.<\/p>\n
Last month the\u00a0ADF killed more than 50 civilians\u00a0in multiple attacks, while an ADF\u00a0attack in July on a church\u00a0left 38 dead.<\/p>\n
MISSING<\/strong><\/p>\n Colonel Alain Kiwewa, the military administrator for Lubero, told Reuters Monday night’s death toll was around 60 and could rise as there were still people missing.<\/p>\n As well as using machetes, the assailants also shot dead some victims and set fire to vehicles, said Samuel Kagheni, a local civil society leader.<\/p>\n Alain Kahindo Kinama, a resident, said Congolese soldiers had arrived at the scene on Tuesday morning and that many people were trying to leave the area.<\/p>\n Congolese army spokesperson Lieutenant Marc Elongo said ADF militants had “already committed the massacre” by the time soldiers intervened.<\/p>\n There was no immediate comment from the ADF.<\/p>\n On Monday, the group claimed credit for five recent attacks on Christian civilians and the Congolese and Ugandan armies, according to the SITE Intelligence Group.<\/p>\n Congo’s army and its ally Uganda say they have intensified operations against the ADF in recent weeks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Allied Democratic Forces rebels with machetes and guns killed more than 50 civilians at a funeral in east Congo, the latest big attack by the ISIS-linked group, officials said. The ADF assault took place on Monday night in the town of Ntoyo in North Kivu province’s Lubero territory, said Macaire Sivikunula, a local administrator. “I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17740,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":1,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","source_name":"Reuters","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,29,2362,1129],"tags":[1271,3769,3042],"class_list":["post-17739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-central-africa","category-east-africa","category-featured","category-security","tag-allied-democratic-forces-adf","tag-east-congo","tag-north-kivu-province"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}