At least 27 killed in attacks in eastern Congo

Kinshasa, Congo: At least 27 people were killed in overnight attacks on villages near the eastern Congolese town of Beni, a local official said on Thursday.

Ewanakawa Nyonyi, spokesman for the mayor of Beni, blamed the attack on Ugandan ADF-NALU rebels that operate alongside a string of other local and foreign armed groups in Democratic Republic of Congo's mineral-rich eastern border zone.

The U.N. peacekeeping mission in Congo was not immediately available for comment. However, it said on Wednesday that ADF-NALU fighters had killed 15 people, including six children between the ages of 7 and 17, in raids in the same area between Oct. 5 and Oct. 8.

Violence simmers in eastern Congo despite U.N. peacekeepers and government troops last year defeating M23 rebels, an insurgency that posed the most serious threat to Kinshasa's authority since Congo's last war officially ended in 2003.