Almost 1,000 prisoners on loose after rebel jailbreak

Nearly 1,000 inmates escaped from a high security prison in Democratic Republic of Congo’s biggest mining town, Lubumbashi, yesterday, after gunmen attacked it to free a rebel leader.

A policeman and a visitor were killed in the attack, during which former rebel commander Gedeon Mutanga and the rest of the prisoners escaped, according to provincial interior minister Jean Marie Dikanga Kazadi.

He said 967 people had escaped from the Kasapa prison, but that 152 of them had since been recaptured.

Mutanga is the former leader of a rebel group in Katanga – Congo’s largest mining province – and was convicted of crimes against humanity in 2009.