US promises to cooperate over Americans’ involvement in DR Congo coup

May 20, 2024

Following the failed coup attempt in the Democratic Republic of Congo on Sunday, which witnessed the involvement and arrest of three of its citizens, the United States government has vowed to cooperate with an investigation by the Central African nation.

In a post on her official X handle on Sunday, the US Ambassador to DR Congo, Lucy Tamlyn, expressed her concern about reports of the alleged involvement of American citizens in the gunfire that started around 4:00 a.m. in Kinshasa.

“Please be assured that we will cooperate with the DRC authorities to the fullest extent as they investigate these criminal acts and hold accountable any US citizen involved in criminal acts,” she wrote.

Earlier in the day, the US Embassy also issued a security alert warning of gunfire and “ongoing activity by DRC security elements.”

Confirming the incident to Reuters, a spokesperson for DR Congo, Sylvain Ekenge, revealed that armed men attacked the presidency in the city centre but added that the coup leader had reportedly been killed while 50 others, which included the Americans, were arrested for the attack.

According to Mr Ekenge, a US-based Congolese politician, Christian Malanga, who led the attempted coup after he had attempted and aborted a coup back in 2017 when one of the nabbed American citizens was his son, “was definitively neutralized during the attack on the Palais de la Nation.”

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“A certain Aboubacar was neutralized during the attack on the residence of Vital Kamarhe, and the others, around 50, including three American citizens, were arrested and are currently undergoing interrogation by the specialised services of the Armed Forces,” Mr Ekenge added.

A yet-to-be-verified live-streamed video of the attack shared on what seemed to be Mr Malanga’s Facebook page showed him saying, “We, the militants, are tired. We cannot drag on with Tshisekedi and Kamerhe. They have done too many stupid things in this country.”