Sunday, 05 July_Gunmen have killed 11 people including military and local officials in northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo, officials said Sunday, an ambush attributed to a militia accused of a string of massacres.
Two vehicles coming from Bunia, the capital of Ituri province, were attacked Saturday at the village of Matete, Djugu territory administrator Adel Alingi Mokuba said.
"The death toll is 11, including the deputy territorial administrator in charge of economy and finance, three policemen and four soldiers," he told AFP.
The convoy was carrying "a former provincial deputy, an accountant, police officers and civilians who were savagely massacred", Ituri governor Jean Bamanisa said in a video posted online.
The governor warned the killers: "The army has not given up".
The attack was the latest attributed to an ethnic militia called CODECO, the Cooperative for the Development of the Congo.
On Friday, DR Congo's army said it had killed seven of the militia's fighters, which claims to defend the interests of the Lendu ethnic group. The Lendu are predominantly farmers who have historically clashed with the Hema community of traders and herders.
Ituri is one of several provinces gripped by militia violence in eastern DR Congo, a country the size of continental western Europe.
More than 1,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in Ituri since December 2017, including 375 since March, according to the United Nations.
"These acts could constitute crimes within the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court," ICC Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda warned on June 4.
The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has accused CODECO and other Lendu fighters of pursuing "a strategy of slaughtering local residents -- mainly the Hema, but also the Alur -- since 2017" to control natural resources in the region.