South African (SA) President Cyril Ramaphosa will join the bereaved families at Swartkop Air Force Base and hand over the remains of their loved ones.

The 14 SA servicemen, along with three Malawians, one Uruguayan, and one Tanzanian, were serving under the UN peacekeeping mission when they were killed in a crossfire between the DRC government forces and the M23 rebel group. The rebels were advancing towards the key city of Goma at the time of the incident.

The bodies had been expected to return home on Wednesday, 5 February, but reports suggested that the M23 rebels, who were reportedly surrounding the SANDF bases around the DRC provincial capital of Goma and the nearby town of Sake, blocked the repatriation.

It was unclear how the repatriation would proceed, but it appeared that the remains were being transported from Goma through Rwanda to Uganda, and then to Tanzania, Malawi, and finally SA.

The SA government was firmly opposed to the remains travelling through Rwanda, particularly the capital city of Kigali. Most of the SANDF soldiers, as well as the three Malawians and one Tanzanian, who died, were deployed in eastern DRC as part of the Southern African Development Community Mission in DRC. Their mandate was to neutralise negative armed groups such as the M23, which have been destabilising the area for years.

--ChannelAfrica--