Militants have burned at least ten civilians to death in an attack on a southwestern town of Uganda.

The gunmen from the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), one of the deadliest militias in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, crossed the border to attack a trading centre in Kamwenge, police said.

"Preliminary findings reveal that ten assailants armed with SMG rifles attacked and fatally burned to death ten people," regional police spokesperson Vincent Twesige said on Tuesday.

The attackers also torched a motorcycle and looted a store, he said.

Airstrikes

Twesige said the Ugandan army had been deployed to pursue the militants.

The attack at around 2am (23:00 GMT) on Monday came days after Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said at least 200 ADF rebels had been killed in September by airstrikes in DR Congo, led by Uganda.

The ADF is historically a Ugandan rebel coalition whose biggest group comprises people opposed to Museveni.

Established in eastern DRC in 1995, the group became the deadliest of scores of outlawed forces in the deeply troubled region.

Deadly attacks

It has been blamed for massacres, kidnappings and looting, with a death toll estimated in the thousands.

In June, ADF militia members killed 42 people including 37 students in a high school in western Uganda near the border with DRC.

It was one of the deadliest attacks in Uganda since 2010, when a double attack in Kampala killed 76 people in a raid claimed by the Somali-based militant group Al-Shabaab.

Last year, the United States placed the ADF on its list of "terrorist" organisations.

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