‘REALLY HORRIBLE’

Six Dead After Christmas Day Suicide Bombing in Eastern Congo

The suicide bomber detonated outside a restaurant in Beni, eastern Congo. “Investigations are underway to find the perpetrators of this terrorist attack,” the city’s mayor said.

A suicide bomber killed 5 people, as well as himself, and wounded at least 14 others after detonating outside the entrance of a restaurant in the city of Beni, eastern Congo on Christmas Day. “We saw black smoke surrounding the bar and people started to cry. We rushed to the exit where I saw people lying down. . . . I also saw heads and arms no longer attached. It was really horrible,” one restaurant patron told the Associated Press. A spokesperson for the region’s governor also claimed that the bomber had tried to attack from within the restaurant but was thwarted by guards at the door. It was then that the terrorist detonated the bomb at the facility’s entrance.

“Investigations are underway to find the perpetrators of this terrorist attack,” Beni’s mayor Narcisse Muteba Kashale, who is also a police colonel, told the AP. “For safety, I’m asking the population to stay home,” the mayor said, quoted by Reuters, which also reported two local officials were among those injured.

The tragedy, which killed at least two children, is reported to be the first fatal terrorist attack in eastern Congo. However, a group linked to the Islamic State known as the Central Africa Province claimed responsibility for a similar, though non-fatal, suicide bombing in the town earlier this year.