DR Congo Violence: U.N. launches investigation into killing in DRC’s Kasai region
The United Nations has launched an investigation into the recent killings in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Kasai region. The UN’s Human Rights Council is keen to probe atrocities which include the alleged amputation of toddlers’ limbs.
The 47- member states of the UN’s Human Rights Council approved the resolution, suggested by African nations, calling for an investigation into the recent killings in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Kasai region.
U.N. rights chief Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein has repeatedly called for an international inquiry. Earlier this week, he said militia linked to the government had carried out a whole range of ethnically-motivated attacks over the last few months.
U.N. human rights investigators are already on the ground in Kasai and Zeid said they reported the situation there had become “much more complex.”
Reading from distressing reports sent back by the U.N. investigators, Zeid said they had documented entire villages destroyed by militia, with hundreds of civilians “shot dead, hacked or burned to death” and “mutilated.”
He said his team had seen toddlers who had had limbs chopped off. And at least two pregnant women who had been stabbed and their “foetuses mutilated.”
In March, two UN investigators, looking into the increased violence, were killed in the Kasai region. However, the newly-initiated UN inquiry has already been criticized by some Human Rights Council members.
The U.S., while welcoming the resolution, said it was doubtful about the Congolese government’s ability to cooperate with a full and transparent investigation.
