On March 15, the Rome-based MISNA agency, said that...

On March 15, the Rome-based MISNA agency, said that more than 100 people were killed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo on March 5 in reprisals by rebel troops. The massacre was carried out by troops of the Congolese Rally for Democracy (RCD) in Kamituga in the eastern South Kivu region. Congolese rebels, backed by Rwanda and Uganda, took up arms against President Laurent Kabila in August 1998 and control much of the eastern region of the former Zaire. MISNA said that the killings were reprisals following an earlier attack on a convoy on its way from the mining center of Kamituga to Kitutu. MISNA said it also had news of other killings and summary executions allegedly carried out by the RCD in Kivu, including 25 people - among them a 5-year-old child - between February 11 and 13. It said a further 78 people were killed in military operations in Lukweti, Rutshuru and Biholo between February 28 and March 1, including 7 women and 2 children.