KAMPALA: Militants linked to the Islamic State group have killed 25 students in western Uganda in the country’s worst such attack in years, police and local officials said on Saturday.
The army said it was pursuing militants from the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) after the cross-border raid on late Friday on a secondary school in Kasese district near the Democratic Republic of Congo.
National police spokesman 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 25 bodies have been recovered from the school and transferred to Bwera Hospital”, he said, referring to a nearby town.
“Also recovered are eight victims, who remain in critical condition at Bwera hospital.”
The Resident Commissioner for Kasese, Joe Walusimbi, told AFP that a number of 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.
Police did not expand on the nature of the attack or how the victims died.
The school is less than two kilometres from the border of DR Congo, where ADF is primarily active and has been accused of killing thousands of civilians since the 1990s.
Enanga said the army and police units were in “hot pursuit” of the attackers who fled in the direction of Virunga National Park over the border in DR Congo.
Uganda Peoples’ Defence Forces spokesman Felix Kulayigye said the ADF may have also kidnapped some people.
“Our forces are pursuing the enemy to rescue those abducted and destroy this group,” he said in a statement.
A vast expanse on the border with Uganda and Rwanda, Virunga is the oldest nature reserve in Africa and is renowned worldwide as a sanctuary for rare species, including mountain gorillas.
But militias — of which dozens are active in the mineral-rich eastern DR Congo — also the use the park as a hideout. – AFP
