Bomb Kills 10 At DR Congo Church

Beni, DR Congo, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 16th Jan, 2023 ) :A bomb killed at least 10 people and wounded 39 others as it ripped through a church in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo on Sunday, in an attack blamed on suspected militants.

A Congolese military spokesman, Antony Mualushayi, said the "terrorist act" happened in a Pentecostal church in North Kivu province's Kasindi, a town on the border with Uganda.

The explosion killed at least 10 people and wounded 39, he added, revising up an initial death toll of five. Both tolls were provisional, the spokesman said.

But the spokesman for Uganda's military operation in the DRC, Bilal Katamba, said on Sunday evening that 16 people had been killed in the blast, and 20 wounded.

"The attackers used an IED to carry out the attack and we suspect ADF is behind the attack," he added.

AFP was unable to independently confirm the death toll.

The DRC's communications ministry said on social media that the attack was apparently carried out by the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF).

The ADF is one of the deadliest of the more than 120 armed groups in eastern DRC, many of them the legacy of regional wars that flared at the turn of the century.

It has been accused of slaughtering thousands of Congolese civilians and carrying out bomb attacks in Uganda. ADF operatives have also planted bombs in towns in North Kivu in the past.

Army spokesman Mualushayi said a Kenyan suspect was arrested in the wake of the attack.