HORROR IN CONGO: OVER 50 KILLED WITH MACHETES AT FUNERAL

What was meant to be a night of mourning turned into a massacre in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where rebels armed with machetes and guns killed more than fifty people during a funeral ceremony.

The attack took place on Monday night in Ntoyo village, Lubero territory of North Kivu province. According to local administrator Macaire Sivikunula, the victims were ambushed around 9 p.m. while gathered for the burial.

Eyewitnesses described harrowing scenes of people being hacked with machetes, shot at close range, and vehicles set ablaze.

Colonel Alain Kiwewa, the military administrator for Lubero, said the death toll could be closer to sixty, with several people still missing. Civil society leader Samuel Kagheni confirmed that the assailants used both guns and machetes, while resident Alain Kahindo Kinama recounted that Congolese soldiers only arrived the following morning—by which time terrified villagers were already fleeing. The army later admitted that the rebels had “already committed the massacre” before their arrival.

Authorities suspect the attackers were fighters from the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a Ugandan-origin rebel group active in Congo since the late 1990s and now affiliated with the Islamic State.

The Ntoyo tragedy adds to a series of recent ADF assaults that have left hundreds dead across eastern Congo. Just last month, more than fifty civilians were killed in multiple raids, while in July, another ADF attack on a church service claimed thirty-eight lives. On Monday, the militants claimed responsibility for five recent strikes targeting Christian civilians as well as Congolese and Ugandan forces, according to the SITE Intelligence Group.

Eastern Congo remains gripped by instability, despite ongoing joint military operations against ADF fighters. The province also faces renewed violence from M23 rebels, who launched a major offensive earlier this year.

As mourning families in Ntoyo count their losses, officials warn the death toll from the funeral massacre could still rise, with many residents unaccounted for.