Warlord killed in Congo

Brazzaville, Congo - A DRC militia boss who had been
hiding in neighbouring Congo-Brazzaville since
being sentenced to death three years ago has
been killed, police said on Sunday.

Udjani Mangbama was among 11 people killed on
Saturday in an area near Owando, 500km north of
Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of the
Congo, top police official Jules Monkala said in a
statement.

He said the fighting left "three dead and four
wounded in police ranks, as well as eight dead
among the attackers, including Udjani
Mangbama".

The ex-rebel leader and his men had failed to
comply with a police check and attacked security
personnel with clubs and machetes, killing three,
he said.

The government spokesperson in the Democratic
Republic of Congo, whose capital Kinshasa sits
across the Congo river from Brazzaville, had said
late on Saturday it was thought Udjani Mangbama
could be among the dead.
Kinshasa had issued a statement saying the
authorities "were surprised and concerned to find
out that Udjani was roaming freely" in the
Republic of Congo.

Udjani, thought to be in his late twenties, and his
father Ibrahim were sentenced to death in
absentia in 2011 by a military tribunal in Kinshasa
for leading an insurgency responsible for war
crimes and crimes against humanity.

Udjani led an armed movement that erupted in
2009 in DRC's northwestern Equateur province
when the Enyele tribe took up arms against the
rival Mayanza over access to fishing ponds.

The Enyele were said to have called upon their
most famous witchdoctor, Udjani's father, who
was said to have performed rites for former
president Mobutu Sese Seko.
Ibrahim Mangbama sent his son instead and the
local conflict soon developed into an armed
insurgency that challenged the government in
Kinshasa and received support from demobilised
members of Jean-Pierre Bemba's ex-rebel MLC
group.

The conflict, which ended in April 2011, killed at
least 270 people and displaced an estimated 200
000, half of them to Brazzaville.
In February 2011, dozens of armed men attacked
the president's residence and a military base
housing large stocks of weapons in Kinshasa.

The DRC authorities had suspected Udjani's
involvement in the brazen assault that left at least
eight soldiers and 11 attackers dead.
DRC President Joseph Kabila signed an amnesty
law in February this year that benefitted several
former members of Udjani's group.