Drone strikes hit Goma in eastern Congo \u200bon Wednesday, killing at least three people, including a French aid worker, the first \u200csuch attack in the city since AFC\/M23 rebels seized it last year, according to the group and the U.N.<\/p>\n
The AFC\/M23 blamed the attack on the Congolese army, saying in a post on X that Kinshasa had launched drones against a \u200bdensely populated urban area in the lakeside city.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for the rebels said in a \u200bseparate post that three people had died, including a foreign humanitarian worker.<\/p>\n
A senior \u2060official for U.N. children’s agency UNICEF told Reuters that one of its employees, a French national, was \u200bkilled.<\/p>\n
The U.N. peacekeeping mission in Congo confirmed that the strikes killed a U.N. staff member and two \u200bother civilians and warned that attacks against U.N. personnel may amount to war crimes.<\/p>\n
French President Emmanuel Macron and Hadja Lahbib, European Commissioner for equality, preparedness and crisis management, condemned the attack in posts on X, calling for respect for \u200binternational humanitarian law and saying aid workers must never be targeted.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for Congo’s army declined to \u200bcomment.<\/p>\n
Late on Wednesday, Congo’s government acknowledged the attack occurred in a statement with condolences to the family of the aid worker \u200cand \u2060said investigations were underway.<\/p>\n
NEIGHBOURING RWANDA CONCERNED<\/strong><\/p>\n Rwanda\u2019s deputy government spokesperson, Jean Maurice Uwera, said in a post on X that the attack underscored security concerns near Rwanda’s border despite a\u00a0U.S.-mediated peace accord\u00a0signed in Washington last year.<\/p>\n The U.S. this month imposed\u00a0sanctions\u00a0on the Rwanda Defence Force and top military officials over alleged support \u200bfor AFC\/M23 rebels in \u200beastern Congo. Rwanda denies \u2060the allegations.<\/p>\n A Reuters journalist in Goma reported hearing two loud explosions at around 4 a.m. (0200 GMT). The blasts shook windows and doors and were followed by \u200bthe sound of ambulance sirens.<\/p>\n A senior AFC\/M23 official told Reuters the house \u200bstruck by one \u2060of the drones had been rented by UNICEF employees and is close to a residence used by former Congolese President Joseph Kabila in a neighbourhood that houses several prominent political and business figures.<\/p>\n The official said \u2060a second \u200bdrone had targeted the residence of AFC\/M23 political coordinator Corneille \u200bNangaa, but fell into Lake Kivu.<\/p>\n The strikes come after weeks of intensifying drone operations on both sides of the conflict.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Drone strikes hit Goma in eastern Congo \u200bon Wednesday, killing at least three people, including a French aid worker, the first \u200csuch attack in the city since AFC\/M23 rebels seized it last year, according to the group and the U.N. The AFC\/M23 blamed the attack on the Congolese army, saying in a post on X […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20151,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":5,"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","show_comment_section":"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":[4828,1393,1468],"class_list":["post-20150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-central-africa","category-east-africa","category-featured","category-security","tag-afc-m23-rebels","tag-eastern-congo","tag-goma"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20150","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=20150"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20150\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20152,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20150\/revisions\/20152"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}