U.N. Calls for Exhumation of Congo Mass Grave

The U.N. mission in Democratic Republic of Congo urged the government on Wednesday to exhume more than 400 bodies buried last month in a mass grave, the head of the organization's human rights office said. Local authorities in the capital Kinshasa have said they buried 421 corpses overnight on March 19 in the rural commune of Maluku. The government says the bodies are unclaimed fetuses, stillborn babies and homeless people from the city morgue. However, Thambwe said on Monday that the decision would be left to the prosecutor leading an investigation into the burials, explaining that the government wanted to show it could conduct a transparent investigation on its own.