Tanzanian president expresses shock over killing of 14 peacekeepers in DRC

DAR ES SALAAM, Dec. 8 (Xinhua) -- Tanzanian President John Magufuli on Friday expressed utter shock over the killing of at least 14 Tanzanian peacekeepers in a raid on a United Nations base in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

The peacekeepers were killed by suspected militiamen on Thursday night, the deadliest attack on Tanzanian soldiers in the DRC in recent memory.

In a statement by the Directorate of Presidential Communication, president Magufuli said 44 other peacekeepers were wounded and the whereabouts of two others was still unknown.

"I have been shocked with sadness the killing of our courageous young soldiers who were on a peacekeeping mission in our neighboring DRC," Magufuli said in a condolence message to the Minister for Defence and National Service, Hussein Mwinyi, and the Chief of Defence Forces, General Venance Mabeyo.

The president appealed to Tanzanians to remain calm at this difficult moment, saying the government was taking appropriate measures.

The United Nations peacekeeping mission in the DRC (MONUSCO) said it was coordinating a joint response with the Congolese army as well as medical evacuations of the wounded from the UN base in North Kivu's Beni territory.

Rival militia groups still control swathes of mineral-rich eastern Congo nearly a decade and a half after the official end of a 1998-2003 war that killed millions of people, most from hunger and disease, according to media reports from DRC.

The 3,000 strong UN intervention brigade consists of troops hailing evenly from Tanzania, Malawi and South Africa.

In 2015, two Tanzanian peacekeepers were killed when their patrol was ambushed at the same North Kivu province. In September and October this year, another three Tanzanian peacekeepers were killed in separate rebel attacks in the DRC. Enditem