Fourteen Christians in North Kivu (map), a province in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, were murdered by members of an Islamic extremist group, the Allied Democratic Forces, after refusing to convert to Islam.
The 14 Christians, “many very young,” were “killed with pangas [machetes] and Kalashnikovs [rifles]” in the town of Eringeti, the Vatican newspaper reported.
In recent decades, North Kivu has experienced much violence, including an Islamist insurgency. As a whole, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a central African nation of 112 million (map), is 95% Christian (52% Catholic), with 2% adhering to ethnic religions.