Gunmen suspected of ties to an ISIL-affiliated group attacked several villages in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, leaving dozens dead, according to local authorities and civil society groups.
During the overnight assault on Cantine, about 50km west of Beni in North Kivu province, the attackers also set fire to a health post. Patients with confirmed and suspected Ebola infections were forced to flee.
Death toll and destruction in Cantine village
Colonel Charles Omeonga, the Beni territorial administrator, said on Friday that fighters from the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) had burned several houses and killed civilians. Justin Paluku, who heads a local civil society group, also blamed the ADF for the attack.
Paluku said, “So far, we have counted 33 bodies and more than 50 houses set on fire, along with various other forms of material destruction.” Another local civil society leader, Tchetche Aliamini, confirmed the death toll. He said most victims had gunshot wounds, while others had been burned or hacked with machetes.
Ebola patients and residents flee the violence
The violence pushed many villagers to other parts of the province, where what is described as the fastest-spreading Ebola outbreak in history is ongoing.
Christian Kakule, medical director of the Kelekele Hospital Centre in Cantine, said 180 patients from the local hospital had fled, including suspected Ebola cases and one confirmed case. He added that high-risk contacts and other people under monitoring had also left.
Kakule warned, “Our concern is that when probable cases end up out in the open like this, they can become a source of transmission and trigger an outbreak of the disease.” He said there was gunfire and that homes were set alight as close as 50 metres from the hospital.
Wider Ebola and security situation in North Kivu
North Kivu currently accounts for almost half of all new infections in the DRC’s Bundibugyo outbreak. It is the second most affected province after Ituri, the epicentre. The province was also the epicentre of three previous Ebola outbreaks, including the 2018-2020 outbreak, which was the country’s largest and deadliest until this year.
The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention has recorded more than 10,000 cases and 5,300 Ebola deaths across the DRC.
The ADF, which has roots in Uganda and pledged allegiance to ISIL in 2019, has long operated in the border region and routinely attacks civilians. In July 2025, it killed 66 people in eastern DRC in what the United Nations called a “bloodbath”. About 100 other armed groups operate in the country, most prominently the Rwanda-backed M23, which has seized key eastern cities while Ebola cases rise.
Paluku said, “This represents a major security failure.” He questioned how the attackers had managed to get past the defences of the loyalist and security forces deployed in the area.
