Armed groups kill 14 in troubled east DR Congo

Armed groups killed 14 people in a string of overnight attacks in an area of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo that has long been shaken by ethnic violence, the army and local officials said.

“During the night, we counted (many) attacks” on both civilians and on military positions, Captain Guillaume Ndjike, an army spokesman in the strife-torn North Kivu province, told AFP. Ndjike blamed the raids on Mai-Mai tribal militias and local self-defence groups often formed on ethnic lines, as well as Rwandan Hutu rebels from the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR). In the bloodiest single attack, seven people were shot dead or hacked to death with machetes in the town of Kibirizi, he said, confirming an earlier report by local officials.  The bloodshed was blamed on the FDLR, which has been present in eastern DRC since the end of the Rwandan genocide 26 years ago.