Congo Troops Kill 30 Civilians, U.N. Says

[XXPANTHAXX]

January 7, 2005, 6:23 PM EST

KINSHASA, Congo -- Renegade army soldiers in eastern Congo
massacred at least 30 civilians, including women and
children, to avenge the deaths of three of their troops, the
United Nations said Friday.

Troops slaughtered the civilians Dec. 17 in the village of
Buramba because they suspected them of supporting Mayi Mayi
militiamen in the area, the U.N. mission in Congo said in a
statement.

It said the renegades were apparently taking revenge for the
killings by the militiamen of three soldiers who tried to
steal rice in the village, which is near the Ugandan border.

"The mission says exact number of civilians killed could be
higher, given that the rebel government troops could have
burned a certain amount of bodies and could have killed
civilians in the hills overlooking Buramba," U.N. Secretary-
General Kofi Annan's office in New York said.

The United Nations, which has thousands of peacekeepers
across this vast, lawless nation, sent a team on Dec. 30-31
to Buramba to investigate reports of violence.

The renegade soldiers, based in nearby Nyamilima, had
formerly served in a Rwandan-backed rebel group that was
integrated into Congo's army after a peace deal in 2002.

The peace accord officially ended the nation's 1998-2002 war,
but fighting has continued sporadically in the east, where
the central government's authority is particularly weak and
armed groups hold sway.

The troops blocked exits to Buramba and carried out "summary
and systematic executions of civilians who didn't manage to
flee," the United Nations said.

Afterward, the town -- completely looted -- was empty of an
estimated 10,000 inhabitants or soldiers.

Some corpses were found burnt, while others were killed in
hills surrounding Buramba, the United Nations said.

Mayi Mayi militiamen already had fled Buramba, and the two
armed groups did not clash.