Militia attack kills at least 69 in eastern DR Congo as insecurity deepens in Ituri

# Militia attack kills at least 69 in eastern DR Congo as insecurity deepens in Ituri

*The attack at the end of April left at least 69 people dead in Ituri province, according to local and security sources, with one civil protection official telling AFP the toll was above 70.*

Local and security sources say armed men affiliated with the Codeco militia killed at least 69 people in an attack in Ituri province in the troubled northeast of the Democratic Republic of Congo at the end of April. The reported death toll was still developing because insecurity in the area delayed the recovery of bodies for several days.

Security sources put the toll at 69 dead, while a local civil protection official, Dieudonne Losa, told AFP that more than 70 people had been killed. The difference in those accounts points to the difficulty of verifying the scale of the violence quickly in an area where armed groups operate and roads are insecure.

The attack came as the United Nations mission in Congo warned of a "deadly" wave of violence in the east, saying dozens of civilians had been killed in recent days in Ituri, North Kivu and South Kivu. That warning placed the latest killings within a wider pattern of attacks on civilians in the mineral-rich eastern part of the country.

Ituri has been one of the most unstable corners of eastern Congo for years, with violence involving militias, army troops and other armed actors repeatedly displacing residents and disrupting travel, farming and trade. The latest killings add to a long record of civilian deaths in a conflict that has persisted for three decades.

The evidence packet does not provide the names of the dead, the exact village or a formal government statement on the attack. What is clear from the reporting is that the killings were carried out by fighters linked to Codeco and that recovery efforts were slowed by the same insecurity that allowed the attack to happen.

For residents in Ituri, that combination has become grimly familiar: a sudden assault, a delayed body count and then a new round of warnings that violence is spreading again. The latest toll, whether 69 or slightly higher, reinforces the scale of the threat facing civilians in eastern Congo and the limits of state control in parts of the province.

Why it matters

The killings show how militia violence remains capable of inflicting mass civilian casualties in eastern Congo even when front-line attention is focused elsewhere. They also highlight the difficulty of confirming casualty figures in remote conflict zones, where access is limited and local witnesses often provide the first available accounting.