Three dead in protests after DR Congo massacre

Three people, including a policeman, were killed today in clashes in a town in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) after a massacre sparked angry accusations of security failures by the government, local officials said.

Several hundred people rallied on the main street of Beni at the end of a three-day mourning period called by civil groups over the murder of dozens of people on Saturday night.

At least 50 people were hacked to death, the UN military mission to DRC said Wednesday, in the latest in a two-year string of attacks blamed on rebels.

Police and troops fired tear gas and warning shots in a bid to break up the crowd, but the protestors blocked off streets with barricades.
 

In the first fatal incident, "a policeman and a civilian were killed, nine people were injured, (comprising) six civilians and three soldiers", Beni Mayor Edmond Masumbuko said.

The head of Beni's civil society movement, Gilbert Kambale, said the civilian fatality was a young man who was killed by a policeman.

The casualty "was shot by a bullet which inflicted an entry wound in the back but did not exit the body," Jeremie Muhindo, a doctor at Beni hospital, told AFP.

At least six demonstrators were arrested in a violent manner and thrown into a military jeep and taken away, an AFP reporter on the scene said.

An effigy of Kabila was burned in the main market, as were flags of Kabila's ruling People's Party for Reconstruction and Democracy (PPRD).

In the second incident, a woman suspected of being a member of the rebel group was lynched in northern Beni, near where the massacre took place, Masumbuko said.

The woman was beaten to death with stones and sticks and her body was then torched, witnesses told AFP.

The massacre occurred just three days after President Joseph Kabila visited Beni and vowed to do everything to ensure peace and security in the troubled region.

Yesterday Prime Minister Augustin Matata was booed by hundreds of demonstrators outside Beni town hall, where he gave a short speech after a three-hour whistle-stop visit.