Two killed in Congo quake

A POWERFUL earthquake toppled homes onto children in the east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo today, killing at least two people in a region already beset by war, poverty and volcanoes.

Dr Jean-Donne Owali said two people died from injuries in his clinic in lakeside Kalemie, DRC, 35 miles from the epicentre.

“Dozens of houses have collapsed, several children were buried by the roofs of their houses,” Owali said.

“Injured people have been sent to local hospitals.”

UN spokesman Michel Bonnardeaux said an unknown number of people were killed or injured. Anne Edgerton, another UN spokesperson in the region, said later that about a dozen injuries had been reported and no deaths could be confirmed.

Bonnardeaux said most of the casualties were struck by falling zinc and steel roofs. He added damage was reported in Kabalo, a town east of Kalemie along the Lukuga River.

The desperately poor region has camps for tens of thousands of refugees from wars and economic collapse in Congo and Burundi.

The US Geological Survey gave a preliminary measurement of 6.8 and located the epicentre about six miles below the surface of Lake Tanganyika, between the DRC and Tanzania.