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KAMPALA, Uganda: A disjointed Ugandan border town prepared on Sunday to bury the victims of a brutal attack by suspected extremist rebels on a school that left 42 people dead, most of them students, as security forces stepped up patrols along the border with the country’s volatile east. Congo. One of eight people injured in Friday night’s attack, in which 38 students were killed, died overnight, said Mpondwe-Loberiha Mayor Sylveste Mabuse.
“Most of the relatives came to collect their bodies” from the morgue, he said.
Some students were burned beyond recognition, while others were shot or hacked to death after gunmen armed with guns and machetes attacked Lhubiriha High School, a co-educational and privately owned school, located about two kilometers (just over a mile) from the border. Congo.
Ugandan authorities believe that at least six students have been kidnapped, taking porters inside Congo.
In addition to the 38 students, the victims included a school guard and three civilians.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the attack in a statement, urging “the importance of collective efforts, including through strengthening regional partnerships, to address insecurity across the (Congo)-Uganda border and restore lasting peace in the region.”
The atmosphere in Mbundwe-Lubereha was tense but calm on Sunday as Ugandan security forces patrolled the streets outside and near the school, which was protected by a cordon of police.
The Ugandan security forces did not give a detailed account of how the rebels, who are active in eastern Congo, managed to carry out the attack.
The group, known as the Allied Democratic Forces, or ADFIt rarely claims responsibility for attacks. It has established ties with the Islamic State.
The ADF has been accused of launching several attacks in recent years targeting civilians in remote parts of eastern Congo, including an attack in March that killed 19 people.
The ADF has long opposed the rule of Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, a security ally of the United States who has held power in the East African country since 1986.
The group was founded in the early 1990s by some Uganda Muslimswho said they had been neglected by Museveni’s policies.
At the time, rebels launched deadly attacks in Ugandan villages as well as in the capital, including a 1998 attack in which 80 students were killed in a town not far from a Friday raid.
The attack followed the same rules of the game: violence against the students. The attackers targeted two dormitories, using excessive force when the boys resisted, according to Ugandan officials.
“This terrorist group couldn’t get in, so they threw a bomb, they threw a petrol bomb,” said Education Minister Janet Museveni, who is also Uganda’s first lady. “So, these kids got burned.”
Students have been attacked because schools are considered easy targets, and pupils are sometimes recruited into the ranks of the insurgents or used to carry food and supplies to the insurgents, and these raids provide media coverage that the extremists covet.
The raid apparently caught the Ugandan authorities by surprise, and first responders arrived after the attackers left.
Mabuse said some villagers have temporarily moved away from the Mpondwe-Lubereha community for fear of further attacks.
The border is porous, with multiple footpaths not monitored by the authorities. Many parts of eastern Congo are outlawed, allowing groups like the ADF to operate because the central government in Kinshasa, the capital, has limited authority there.
But attacks by the ADF on the Ugandan side of the border are rare, thanks in part to the presence of a Ugandan Forces brigade in the area.
Ugandan forces have been deployed to eastern Congo since 2021 as part of a military operation to hunt down ADF fighters and prevent them from attacking civilians across the border.
The deployment of Ugandan forces inside Congo follows attacks in which at least four civilians were killed when suicide bombers believed to be members of the ADF detonated their explosives at two locations in Kampala, the capital, in November 2021.
One attack occurred near the parliament building and the second near a busy police station.
“Most of the relatives came to collect their bodies” from the morgue, he said.
Some students were burned beyond recognition, while others were shot or hacked to death after gunmen armed with guns and machetes attacked Lhubiriha High School, a co-educational and privately owned school, located about two kilometers (just over a mile) from the border. Congo.
Ugandan authorities believe that at least six students have been kidnapped, taking porters inside Congo.
In addition to the 38 students, the victims included a school guard and three civilians.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the attack in a statement, urging “the importance of collective efforts, including through strengthening regional partnerships, to address insecurity across the (Congo)-Uganda border and restore lasting peace in the region.”
The atmosphere in Mbundwe-Lubereha was tense but calm on Sunday as Ugandan security forces patrolled the streets outside and near the school, which was protected by a cordon of police.
The Ugandan security forces did not give a detailed account of how the rebels, who are active in eastern Congo, managed to carry out the attack.
The group, known as the Allied Democratic Forces, or ADFIt rarely claims responsibility for attacks. It has established ties with the Islamic State.
The ADF has been accused of launching several attacks in recent years targeting civilians in remote parts of eastern Congo, including an attack in March that killed 19 people.
The ADF has long opposed the rule of Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, a security ally of the United States who has held power in the East African country since 1986.
The group was founded in the early 1990s by some Uganda Muslimswho said they had been neglected by Museveni’s policies.
At the time, rebels launched deadly attacks in Ugandan villages as well as in the capital, including a 1998 attack in which 80 students were killed in a town not far from a Friday raid.
The attack followed the same rules of the game: violence against the students. The attackers targeted two dormitories, using excessive force when the boys resisted, according to Ugandan officials.
“This terrorist group couldn’t get in, so they threw a bomb, they threw a petrol bomb,” said Education Minister Janet Museveni, who is also Uganda’s first lady. “So, these kids got burned.”
Students have been attacked because schools are considered easy targets, and pupils are sometimes recruited into the ranks of the insurgents or used to carry food and supplies to the insurgents, and these raids provide media coverage that the extremists covet.
The raid apparently caught the Ugandan authorities by surprise, and first responders arrived after the attackers left.
Mabuse said some villagers have temporarily moved away from the Mpondwe-Lubereha community for fear of further attacks.
The border is porous, with multiple footpaths not monitored by the authorities. Many parts of eastern Congo are outlawed, allowing groups like the ADF to operate because the central government in Kinshasa, the capital, has limited authority there.
But attacks by the ADF on the Ugandan side of the border are rare, thanks in part to the presence of a Ugandan Forces brigade in the area.
Ugandan forces have been deployed to eastern Congo since 2021 as part of a military operation to hunt down ADF fighters and prevent them from attacking civilians across the border.
The deployment of Ugandan forces inside Congo follows attacks in which at least four civilians were killed when suicide bombers believed to be members of the ADF detonated their explosives at two locations in Kampala, the capital, in November 2021.
One attack occurred near the parliament building and the second near a busy police station.
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