A Pakistani UN peacekeeper was killed by "members of an armed group" in the Democratic Republic of Congo yesterday, a United Nations spokesman said. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres "condemns the killing of a peacekeeper from Pakistan... following an ambush" in the troubled eastern province of South Kivu, a UN spokesman said. He reaffirmed the UN's willingness to continue to address the country's security challenges, despite tensions with the government. On Friday Congolese President Joseph Kabila claimed the UN's peacekeeping mission in the country MONUSCO had "eradicated" no armed group in nearly 20 years. He warned the mission not to consider the country "under the care of the United Nations" and said he would "clarify in the coming days our relations" with the world body. MONUSCO, the largest of the UN missions, has been present in the country since 1999. Sprawling, mineral-rich but mired in poverty, DR Congo is in the grip of overlapping political and ethnic crises, and much of the country's east is in the hands of rival militia groups competing over resources.
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