70 sect members killed in DR Congo

Kinshasa – Violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo has killed nearly 100 people this week, including 87 in a government crackdown on members of a religious sect, officials and UN peacekeepers said Saturday.

“At least 87 people, including 10 from the security forces, were killed” during the clashes in Bas Congo province in western DRC, said interior minister General Denis Kalume Numbi.

The total was made up of 16 people in the Bas Congo capital Matadi, 26 in nearby Boma, 37 in Muanda and eight in Songololo, he said in the first official statement on the number of casualties.

A Western diplonat in Kinshasa said he expected the death toll to “rise and could exceed 100″ because of the high number of people with gunshot wounds.

Filed official complaints

The clashes began on Wednesday and followed allegations by the Bunda dia Kongo (BDK) religious movement that the recent first-round election of Bas Congo’s governor – a candidate close to victorious presidential candidate Joseph Kabila – was rigged.

Bemba’s opposition Congo Liberation Movement (MLC) said on Saturday that it had filed official complaints about the result in Bas Congo as well as in the capital Kinshasa.

Candidates from Kabila’s political coalition, the Alliance of the Presidential Majority (AMP), won first-round victories in eight of the nine provincial assemblies choosing governors last month.

The results cemented the political dominance of Kabila, whose camp already dominated both houses of parliament as well as seven of the 11 provincial assemblies.

The United Nations mission in DRC, known as Monuc, meanwhile said on Saturday said that in the restive eastern province of Sud Kivu, six rebels and three government soldiers were killed in the Minembwe area.

There have been clashes on a daily basis in the area since January 25 between the army and soldiers loyal to dissident General Michel Rukunda, and the violence intensified at the start of the week.

No pillaging found

Monuc spokesperson Thierry Kranzer said they had been unable to confirm allegations that the regular army, commanded by Major Patrick Masunzu, had been involved in massacres and burning villages with the assistance of Rwandan Hutu rebels.

Monuc “went to the village of Azarias Ruberwa, where it found no pillage, no trace of fighting,” Kranzer said.

Rwandan rebel group FDLR also denied any involvement.

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