Rebels linked to ISIS have killed about 41 people, including 38 students who were burned, shot or hacked to death with machetes in a sickening attack on a school in Uganda.
Ugandan authorities have recovered the bodies of 41 victims, which included 38 students, one guard and two members of the local community who were shot outside the school, Mpondwe-Lhubiriha Mayor, Selevest Mapoze, said on Saturday.
It was gathered that an unknown number of people were also abducted by the rebels, who fled across the porous border into Congo after the raid on Friday night.
Police said the rebels from the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), who have been launching attacks for years from their bases in the volatile eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo and have ties to the Islamic State group (ISI), carried out the raid on Lhubiriha Secondary School in the border town of Mpondwe, late on Friday.
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Mr Mapoze said that while some of the pupils suffered fatal burns when the rebels set fire to a dormitory, others were shot or hacked with machetes, DailyMail.com reports.
Earlier today, the National police spokesman in Uganda, Fred Enanga said, “A dormitory was burnt and food store looted in the attack on Lhubiriha Secondary School in Mpondwe by the ADF, which is based in DR Congo’s strife-torn east.
“So far bodies have been recovered from the school and transferred to Bwera Hospital.” The hospital is situated in a nearby town.
He continued, “Also recovered are eight victims who remain in critical condition at Bwera Hospital.”
The Resident Commissioner for Kasese, Joe Walusimbi, further told AFP some students were still missing and the deceased so far were all pupils. “All of the dead so far are confirmed to be students at the school,” he said.
Meanwhile, the police did not expand on the nature of the attack or how the victims died.
The school, which is co-educational and privately owned, is located in the Ugandan district of Kasese, about 1.2 miles from the DR Congo border.
Officers said Ugandan troops tracked the attackers into Congo’s Virunga National Park. The military confirmed in a statement that Ugandan troops inside Congo ‘are pursuing the enemy to rescue those abducted’.
