Two UN military observers abducted in Beni

Two UN military observers were abducted on Thursday in the town of Beni, in North Kivu Province of northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the UN Mission in the DRC, MONUC, reported. "One of our team sites was attacked on Thursday night and the two milobs [military observers] who were there were taken to an unknown destination," Hamadoun Toure, MONUC’s spokesman, told IRIN. "The team site was ransacked, according to a military official from RCD-K/ML [Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie-Kisangani/Mouvement de liberation, the rebel group that controls the region]." "We are trying to identify those responsible for these acts in order to secure the immediate release of our colleagues," Toure said. He added that the six other military observers and five civilian staff of MONUC had been accounted for. For his part, RCD-K/ML leader Mbusa Nyamwisi told AFP he was "shocked" and did not rule out the possibility that the abduction may have been carried out by men from his movement. "We are following very serious leads, there is a probability that the kidnappers are RCD-K/ML members who are betrayers corrupted by the enemy," AFP quoted Nyamwisi as saying. "We are going to find the milobs and tidy things up."