Six people killed in DR Congo protest crackdown: UN

SIX people were killed in the Democratic Republic of Congo on Sunday, the UN said, as the authorities cracked down on a banned protest against President Joseph Kabila.

Witnesses said security forces fired live rounds and tear gas in Kinshasa to disperse demonstrators who had gathered after Catholic Church leaders called for a mass peaceful demonstration against Kabila’s 17-year rule. The UN peacekeeping mission Monusco said six were killed in Kinshasa and 57 injured nationwide in the rallies.

“The defence and security forces did not apply the principles of necessity, proportionality and legality in accordance with international standards,” Monusco spokesperson Florence Marchal said. Monusco said 111 people were arrested across the country, adding that some UN observers were “threatened and harassed” by security forces in the capital.

A spokesman for the national police said that “two people were killed” in the capital, while nine policemen were wounded, two of them seriously.

Of the two killed, according to the authorities’ toll, one was shot at close range by a police officer, the presidency’s spokesman Yvon Ramazani said.

“The policeman is under arrest and must be brought to justice,” he said.

Sunday’s crackdown comes three weeks after a march on New Year’s Eve ended in deadly violence, during which the UN said five people were killed.

In the latest violence, a 16-year-old girl died after shots were fired from an armoured vehicle at the entrance to a church in the Kitambo area of the capital, Jean-Baptise Sondji, a former minister and government opponent, said.

Tensions were also reported in the major cities of Kisangani, Lubumbashi, Goma, Beni and Mbuji Mayi.

The country’s powerful Catholic Church, one of the few institutions to enjoy broad credibility nationally, had called for the rallies despite a govern- ment ban on all demonstrations since September 2016, when anti-Kabila protests first turned violent.

Kabila, 46, has been in power since 2001, at the helm of a regime criticised for corruption, repression and incompetence. His constitutional term in office expired in December 2016, but he stayed on, stoking bloody violence.

Under an agreement brokered by the Catholic Church, he was allowed to stay in office provided new elections were held in 2017. The authorities later blamed organisational problems for a new delay until December 23, 2018 – a postponement that has angered Western nations, but one that they have reluctantly accepted.