https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2023-01-16-kenyan-arrested-over-drc-church-bombing-identified/
In connection with the bombing of a church on Sunday in North Kivu, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which left not fewer than 10 people dead, a Kenyan was detained.
Abdirizak Muktar Garad, a 29-year-old native of Wajir County, is being held by Congolese authorities, according to Kenyan officials, who claimed to have received word of this.
On January 15, a bomb attack at a church in Kasindi, close to the border between the DRC and Uganda, resulted in at least 39 further injuries.
Investigators at the Anti-Terror Police Unit in Nairobi stated that they were double-checking the suspect's data to obtain more background information.
They acknowledged receiving information about the arrest.
A Kenyan was detained for allegedly having connections to the attack's planning, according to a local FARDC spokesman, Anthony Mualushayi, who made the announcement on Sunday. The attack is now believed to have been planned by the ADF.
This instance is the most recent to associate a Kenyan with the same.
In January 2022, another Kenyan, Salim Rashid Mohamed aka Chotara, was arrested in the DRC following months of a manhunt by Congolese authorities in connection with terror claims.
Authorities had then claimed that a network of terrorists had been established in the DRC, attracting certain people from across East Africa.
Officials said Salim and several other suspects were said to have crossed into the DRC via Uganda.
The terrorist strike on Sunday, according to the FARDC, was carried out "in retribution for the casualties these terrorists have sustained in various battlefields against the FARDC."
In the eastern DRC, a Protestant church was the scene of a bombing that occurred during a service. The attack on the Sunday service in Kasindi, which is near the Ugandan border, was probably conducted out by the Allied Democratic Force (ADF), a Ugandan armed militia that has sworn allegiance to ISIL, according to Mualushay (ISIS).
According to reports, the ISIL organization claimed credit for the incident later on Sunday.
Although the ADF has roots in the DRC dating to the late 1990s, its initial insurrection took place in Uganda.
The blast, according to survivors and witnesses, separated several people's limbs from their carcasses.
Kasindi is located in a province where the ADF is being attacked by Congolese and Ugandan soldiers.
The Ugandan army has sent troops to the eastern Congo in an effort to quell the unrest, but the strikes have grown more frequent and widespread.
In attacks since April, the ADF has murdered at least 370 citizens and kidnapped hundreds more, according to a report released by the UN last month.
The rebel organization has expanded its area of control to include Goma and the nearby province of Ituri, which is occupied by Kenyan forces.
The mineral-rich eastern DRC is home to more than 120 armed organizations. The consequences of the regional wars that broke out at the beginning of the century are numerous.
Content created and supplied by: Wentworth (via Opera News )
COMMENTS