An armed group linked to the Islamic State murdered dozens of faithful in a Catholic Church in the northwest of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, when they participated in a prayer vigil.
As reported BBCmembers of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) broke into a church in the city of Komanda, where they killed the faithful Catholics by shooting, and then looting and burning nearby businesses.
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Komanda is in the province of Ituri, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, an area rich in minerals and whose control disputes several armed groups.
Dieudonne Duranthabo, Coordinator of Civil Society in Komanda, told Associated Press that “more than 21 people were shot dead and off the church, and we have registered at least three carbonized bodies and several burned houses, but the search continues”
In turn, Fr. Aime Lokana Dhego, a local priest, told AFP that “we have at least 31 members of the dead Eucharistic crusade, and six serious injuries. Some young people were kidnapped; we have no news of them.”
On the other hand, the Radio Okapi estimated at 43 the number of deaths.
Italy’s Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, The massacre condemned this Sunday through his X account: “I express the most energetic condemnation of the attack on a church in Komanda, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where a terrorist group linked to ISIS killed more than 40 civilians.”
“The places of worship must always be preserved and religious freedom must protect themselves. Italy is solidarity with the families of the victims and the Congolese people,” he added.
What are ADF?
BBC explains that the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) emerged in Uganda in the 1990s, accusing the government of persecuting Muslims, but now they have their base on the other side of the border, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where civilians of any religion regularly attack, as in Uganda.
Vatican News It states that the ADFs are “responsible for the murder of thousands of people. Two weeks ago they killed 66 people in the Irumu area.”
Jamil Mukulu, a Christian converted to Islam, is the founder of the ADF, who at the beginning of 2024, recalls the Vatican medium, also perpetrated an attack on the eastern part of the country where at least eight people were killed, five of them while praying, and another 30 were taken as hostages.
Walter Sánchez Silva
I am husband since 2008. With my wife we have three children here and one who went to heaven in 2023, before birth. Since I joined ACI Press in 2005, I have had the opportunity to cover various events of the Catholic Church. Among them, the World Youth Days in Colonia, Madrid and Rio de Janeiro and the apostolic trips of Pope Benedict XVI to Mexico and Pope Francis to South Korea. I have been sent to the Vatican to cover the family’s synods, in 2015; of the Amazon, in 2019 and that of Sinodality, in 2023. I follow the situation of the Catholic Church in Nicaragua, which suffers the persecution of the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega, as well as the ecclesial news in the region.