March 5 (EUROPA PRESS) –
Three people have died and three more have been injured in clashes between the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and armed militiamen in the town of Uvira, in the province of South Kivu.
The clashes began on Saturday night and lasted until Sunday. The death of a soldier and two civilians has been confirmed and there is a seriously wounded soldier, according to the Congolese radio station Radio Okapi.
The coordinator of the Urban Youth Committee for the area, Chako Changu Ebambe, explained that a soldier who was there after trying to rob a house was arrested by self-defense militiamen. The soldier tried to escape and shot and killed one of the youths. The other youths seized the soldier and beat him, for which he was seriously injured and taken to a hospital.
In the morning, the young people have come out to protest this incident and have erected barricades to denounce the robberies by the military. A soldier passing through Mulongwe was attacked by the protesters and opened fire on the crowd before fleeing. A young man has died. He was eventually caught up in the Mulongwe River, where they seized his gun and shot him.
Police and the military have since managed to dismantle the barricades and are continuing to work to bring the situation under control, according to a military spokesman, Marc Elongo.
