Militants kill 7 in eastern DR Congo

Militants have killed seven civilians in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, local officials said on Sunday, in the latest attack to hit the turbulent region.

CODECO militiamen attacked an army position in the Djukoth area of Ituri province’s Mahagi territory on Saturday evening, according to local Red Cross worker.

Ituri province is one of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo’s violence hotspots, where attacks claiming dozens of lives are routine.

Seven civilians were killed near the position, said the official, who declined to be named. Five children and two women were among the dead.

Innocent Wabekudu, a community leader in Mahagi, also said that CODECO fighters had “savagely killed” seven people, who were buried on Sunday.

The Congolese army spokesman for military operations in Ituri, Lieutenant Jules Ngongo, was not immediately available for comment about details of the attack.

Armed groups have plagued mineral-rich eastern DR Congo for three decades, a legacy of regional wars that flared in the 1990s and 2000s.

The CODECO, or or Cooperative for the Development of the Congo, claims to protect the Lendu community from another ethnic group, the Hema, as well as the DRC army.