MONUSCO peacekeepers shoot and kill several people on the DRC-Uganda border

July 31 (EUROPA PRESS) –

Peacekeepers from the UN mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO) have left an as yet undetermined number of dead and wounded after opening fire on the population in the town of Kasindi, in North Kivu, near the border with Uganda for reasons still under investigation, as confirmed by the UN itself.

The special representative of the United Nations in the country, Bintou Keita, has indicated for the time being that the peacekeepers “opened their way with gunfire for inexplicable reasons” and caused “loss of lives and serious injuries”.

Keita has declared himself “deeply shocked and dismayed by this serious incident”, and has presented “his deepest condolences to the families of the victims” before reporting that the ‘blue helmets’ involved in the incident, and whose nationality has not been released, they have been arrested, according to the official note collected by the Congolese news portal Actualité.

“Contacts have also been established with the country of origin of these soldiers so that legal proceedings can be initiated urgently with the participation of victims and witnesses, so that exemplary sanctions can be taken as soon as possible,” added Keita.

It should be remembered that since the beginning of last week, the population of eastern DRC has staged several demonstrations to demand the departure of MONUSCO because, according to the participants in the protests, it has failed in its mission to restore peace in the country.

The unrest began on Monday when violent protesters stormed a MONUSCO building in the city of Goma, in North Kivu province. At least 22 people died in the protests, which later spread to several cities in the country.

MONUSCO has been stationed in northeast Congo for more than 20 years, in an attempt to shore up peace in the country despite the presence of some 130 different armed groups vying for control of the DRC’s vast natural resources, which they include copper, cobalt, gold and diamonds, particularly in the extremely violent provinces of North Kivu and Ituri.

Precisely the head of UN peace operations, Jean-Pierre Lacroix, is right now in the country’s capital, Kinshasa, with the intention of smoothing things over with the Congolese authorities, as he did in Mali a week ago.