250 killed in Congo butchery: UN report

The UN yesterday detailed more than 250 "extrajudicial or targeted killings" of civilians in the Democratic Republic of Congo's Kasai region from mid-March to mid-June, counting dozens of children among those massacred.

The findings, based on interviews with 96 refugees from the conflict-hit Kasai who had fled to Angola, blamed state agents for the murders of seven children.

The refugees gave harrowing accounts of the violence in the central region, which the UN warned had taken on "an increasing and disturbing ethnic dimension."

Victims recounted mutilations, including of a seven-year-old boy whose fingers were cut off, and an attack on a hospital in the village of Cinq where 90 people were killed, some because they were too injured to escape a raging fire.

Aside from government troops, the UN blamed a reportedly state-backed militia called the Bana Mura as well as the anti-government Kamuina Nsapu militia for a range of atrocities.

"Survivors have spoken of hearing the screams of people being burned alive, of seeing loved ones chased and cut down, of themselves fleeing in terror", the United Nations human rights chief Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein said in a statement.

A team of investigators has confirmed 251 executions between March 12 and June 19, the UN report said.