DR Congo village raid leaves dozens dead and scatters Ebola patients

Dozens of civilians have been killed in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo after suspected Islamist militants raided communities and burned a healthcare clinic in an area grappling with a major Ebola outbreak.

Officials and local community leaders reported that at least 33 people lost their lives during the overnight assault in Cantine, a community situated around 50 kilometres west of Beni in North Kivu province. Attackers torched more than 50 homes, while medical staff and patients—including those confirmed or suspected to have Ebola—were forced to flee the vicinity.

Local authorities and civil society organisations have attributed the violence to the Allied Democratic Forces, an armed group originating in Uganda that aligned itself with ISIL in 2019. Colonel Charles Omeonga, the territorial administrator for Beni, confirmed that ADF fighters set fire to dwellings and murdered residents.

Justin Paluku, a representative of a local civil society network, told the Associated Press that searchers had counted 33 bodies amid widespread structural damage, describing the breach of local security as a grave failure given the military presence in the sector. Another community leader, Tchetche Aliamini, informed Reuters that victims were shot, burned, or killed with machetes.

The raid has sparked severe alarm among public health officials managing what has become an unprecedented Ebola outbreak across the region. Christian Kakule, the medical director at the Kelekele Hospital Centre in Cantine, stated that around 180 patients fled the facility when shooting erupted and houses were set ablaze just 50 metres away. Those who escaped included individuals undergoing monitoring, suspected infection cases, and at least one confirmed Ebola patient.

Health personnel warn that the displacement of unmonitored and potentially infected people into surrounding communities risks accelerating transmission of the virus. North Kivu currently represents nearly half of all newly recorded infections in the ongoing Bundibugyo strain outbreak, trailing only neighbouring Ituri province in total case numbers. Across the country, the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention has logged over 10,000 cases and more than 5,300 deaths linked to the epidemic.

Insecurity continues to severely complicate the humanitarian response in eastern Congo, where roughly 100 rebel factions are active. The ADF has maintained a protracted campaign of terror against civilian settlements in border areas, including a massacre that claimed 66 lives in July 2025. At the same time, regional stability has been further compromised by the M23 militia, which has captured substantial territory across the eastern provinces.