ICC Note: Despite slowing news coverage of the crisis in DRC, IDP and refugee populations continue to grow. Along with this crisis however is an ever growing number of people being reached with the gospel.

08/31/2018 DRC (Mission News Network) – As the refugee crisis drags on in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), it is making fewer and fewer headlines. However, the crisis is far from over.

Hundreds of thousands of people in the DRC are displaced because of terrible violence in the east. Some of it is tribal, some of it is political, but either way, the outcome is the same.

In the city of Bunia, thousands of internally displaced people (IDPs) live in tarp tents with little to go home to. Most have lost their homes, livelihoods, and even loved ones in the fighting.

Jon Cadd, program manager with Christian organization Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) in eastern DRC, says, “There was a lot of violence between a couple of tribal groups to the north of us about 50 miles. Really, really violent things. People had their arms cut off and hacked with machetes across the back of the neck and across the face. Numerous people [were] killed and it just sparked a refugee crisis. Everybody… ran out of that area and thousands of people ended up in Bunia in various refugee camps.”

MAF provides aviation services to ministries and organizations in remote and isolated areas. According to Cadd, providing food, tarps, and relief supplies to refugees isn’t necessarily in the direct scope of what MAF does as an aviation ministry in the DRC. But they had to do something.

“This is in our backyard and we just can’t let it go. People are really hungry and have been without shelter. So over the last couple of months, we’ve given tarps for makeshift tents to keep them out of the rain and sun and [have] been supplying food, rice, beans, soap for cleanliness and just all kinds of supplies for keeping the people alive there.”

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For interviews with Nathan Johnson, ICC’s Regional Manager, please contact Olivia Miller, Communications Coordinator: press@persecution.org