The smell of decomposing bodies filled the air as cemetery workers in eastern Congo unloaded dozens of coffins at the final resting place for victims of one of the deadliest crackdowns on protests in recent local memory.
At least 56 people were killed on August 30, according to a military prosecutor, after Congolese soldiers in the city of Goma opened fire on protesters ahead of a demonstration against the presence of UN peacekeepers.
A military court on Monday sentenced some of those accused of orchestrating the bloodshed, and the government has paid for burials and offered compensation to the grieving and angry families.
On Monday, three of six soldiers on trial for their role in the killings were sentenced to 10 years behind bars, while the head of the Republic Guard unit in Goma was handed the death penalty, which is expected to be commuted to life imprisonment. The two others were acquitted.
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