By James Tasamba
KIGALI, Rwanda (AA) – More than 250 civilians taken hostage by members of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) rebel group in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo have been rescued from captivity, the military said Thursday.
Army spokesman Anthony Mualushayi said the civilians were rescued during separate military operations from March to July 2023 in North Kivu province.
He said at least 229 rebels were killed and 191 others captured over the same period.
“Some 78 rebels surrendered to the army while 177 weapons were recovered during the different military operations,” Mualushayi said.
He was addressing a delegation of military experts from the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR), composed of 11 regional countries, who were in Beni in North Kivu to assess the security situation there.
Thousands of people in the two most conflict-affected eastern DR Congo provinces of North Kivu and Ituri live in camps.
In late 2021, the Congolese and Ugandan military launched joint operations to flush out the ADF, which was founded in the 1990s by several opposition movements in Uganda to topple President Yoweri Museveni’s government.
The group pledged allegiance to the Daesh/ISIS terrorist group in 2019.