DR Congo: Government condemns bombing in Kasindi, North Kivu
Kinshasa, DR Congo (PANA) - The government has condemned the bomb attack perpetrated on Sunday 14 January, 2023, on a church in Kasindi in the province of North Kivu (eastern DR Congo), a border town between DR Congo and Uganda,
"The government vigorously condemns the bomb attack visibly perpetrated by ADF terrorists, this Sunday, January 15, 2023, against citizens in the middle of worship in the parish of the 8th community of Pentecostal churches of Congo in the city of Kasindi in North Kivu," wrote on his Twitter the Minister of Communication and Media and Spokesperson for the government, Patrick Muyaya.
The Congolese government spokesman accused the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) terrorists, affiliated since 2019 to the Islamic State, of being responsible for this bombing.
In a statement, the army announced that it had caught a suspect.
According to the spokesman of the Armed Forces of the DR Congo (FARDC) in the Beni region, Captain Antony Mualushayi, a Kenyan national, suspected of having participated in this attack, is under arrest.
"We have managed to get hold of a Kenyan subject who was involved in this attack. By exploiting the arrested suspect, everything suggests that this is indeed a terrorist act by the ADF-MTM terrorists, to accomplish their will to attack one of the settlements, because this is how the terrorists had already predicted since the end of the year celebrations," he said.
"It is clear that this is a terrorist act perpetrated by the ADF terrorists who have suffered losses on several battlefields by the armed forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo," he said.
He welcomed the collaboration of the population and invited them to be vigilant, to be wary of gatherings and to denounce suspicious people in their environment.
"The ADF carried out this attack because they are cornered in depth," explained Captain Mualushayi.
The provisional death toll from this explosion is around 10 people and around 60 injured. This is the first time this has happened in a church in DR Congo.
Kasindi is about eight kilometres from Beni where the ADF is active.
-0- PANA KON/IS/BBA/RA 16Jan2023
