At least 10 people were killed and 15 injured in a terrorist bombing during a Sunday service at a church at the Uganda-Democratic Republic of Congo border crossing.
Details of the attack are unclear, but Congolese military spokesman Antony Mouarshay said a “terrorist attack” occurred at a Pentecostal church in Kasindi, North Kivu province, which borders Uganda.
Witness Julius Kasake said he was walking by a church when he heard a loud explosion. He said people from surrounding homes ran to the church to help those affected by the blast.
Congolese military spokesman Anthony Muarshayi said the attack was likely carried out by the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a Ugandan terrorist group affiliated with the Daesh/ISIS terror group.
The Ugandan military immediately stepped up security at the border crossing and the surrounding area.
In April last year, a woman set fire to a suicide vest in a bar in Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, according to independent UN experts. The attack killed 6 of her and wounded 16.
Recall that the ADF has been active since the late 1990s in North Kivu province in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, near the border with Uganda. Repeated military attacks on the ADF crippled it, but the ADF was able to revive because its recruitment and financial networks remained intact. Some of the attacks it is accused of also appear to have been carried out by other rebel groups and the Congolese military.
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As of 2015, the ADF has undergone radicalization following the imprisonment of its leader Jamil Mukulu and the rise of Musa Baluku to replace him. As of 2019, the ADF was split, with some remaining loyal to Mukulu and others defecting to the Islamic State’s Central African Province under Baluku.
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