United Nations peacekeepers in the northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo have killed as many as 60 militia members in a vicious gun fight that wounded two of the UN troops, a UN spokesperson said on Wednesday.
The clash took place on Tuesday, about 30km north of Bunia, the capital of the violent Ituri province, where nine peacekeepers were ambushed and killed last week by militia members.
”While on operation we were fired upon, so we immediately responded,” said Colonel Dominique Demange, spokesperson for the UN forces in the DRC.
Demange said the United Nations used an attack helicopter in the operation against the militia. He said between 50 and 60 militia members had been confirmed dead.
It is the greatest number of enemy combatants killed by peacekeepers since the DRC mission was created in 1999.
The operation involved over 200 peacekeepers, two transport helicopters and armored vehicles, said UN spokesperson Eliane Nabaa.
Two peacekeepers were wounded in the barrage of gunfire and evacuated to South Africa, said Nabaa.
The militia belonged to the ethnic Lendu group, The Nationalist and Integrationist Front, who have been terrorising villages of the rival Hema tribe for months. The United Nations suspects the same militia is responsible for slaying the nine Bangladeshi peacekeepers.
Since December, Lendu militia have killed dozens of people, looted and burned homes and forced over 70 000 people to roam the hills in search of safety.
”This group continues to loot, kill and rape these people, making life miserable,” said Nabaa. ”It’s time to put an end to this militia.”
Hundreds of peacekeepers were dispatched to several areas of the isolated, scenic territory to provide shelter, food and medicine.
However, following the slaying of the nine UN soldiers, the United Nations announced it was suspending humanitarian assistance to 54 000 people due to increased violence.
The young Lendu fighters — who often wear wigs and women’s dresses in battle because they believe it will protect them from harm — are accused of massacring thousands of Hema in macabre village raids over the years.
Since 1999, fighting in the northeastern district of Ituri has killed more than 50 000 and forced 500 000 to flee their homes, UN officials and human rights groups say.
The Ituri conflict is a bloody sideshow to the DRC’s five-year, six-nation war that ended in 2002 with the formation of a transitional government a year later, which has struggled to extend its authority to the long-ungoverned east. – Sapa-AP