THE European Union drone that crashed over Kinshasa last week while monitoring elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo was shot down, it emerged yesterday.

“It was a deliberate act,” Ingrid Beck, a spokeswoman for Belgium, which supplied the drone. A small-calibre bullet had hit the drone, causing it to break up and crash into a house in the capital, she added.

A team is expected to arrive in Kinshasa tomorrow to investigate the incident. The drone crashed into a house on July 28, injuring eight people.

Colonel David Pincet, a senior commander of Eufor, the EU troops in the DRC, said that they had the “means to dissuade” the using of force to challenge the results of the July 30 presidential and parliamentary elections.

“The Congolese people turned out to vote in great numbers, and were able to have their voices heard calmly and with dignity, demonstrating their will to build a democratic and peaceful Congo,” Colonel Pincet said.

“We have the means to dissuade those who try to challenge the results by non-legal means,” he added.

The International Committee in Support of the Transition in DRC has expressed concern about politicians using partially collected results from polling stations and presenting them as representative of the national trend. Circulating partial election results “threatened public order”, it said.

Full results are not due until August 31.

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