At least 48 people have been killed in a crackdown on an anti-UN protest in eastern DR Congo, according to sources and official documentation reviewed by AFP on Thursday, raising a previously reported death toll.
On Wednesday, Congolese soldiers stopped a religious sect from holding a demonstration against United Nations peacekeepers in the city of Goma.
Some 10 people were initially reported killed after the troops entered a radio station and a place of worship, according to local sources. A policeman was also lynched in the violence.
But an internal army document consulted by AFP on Thursday, and verified by security officials, gave a toll of 48 people killed in the incident — in addition to the slain policeman — and 75 people wounded.
The document also said soldiers seized a number of bladed weapons and arrested 168 people, including the leader of the Christian-animist sect, which is named “Natural Judaic and Messianic Faith towards the Nations”.