Uganda's Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) militia have killed 58 people in Ituri Province in the DR Congo, authorities there said on Thursday.

According to the Province's interior minister, Adjio Gidi, 23 people were killed in Irumu territory in southern Ituri on Tuesday, followed by another 35 in the same region on Thursday.

"Large numbers of the population” have fled their homes, he told AFP, a French news agency.

Gidi blames the ADF which originated from western Uganda in the 1990s.

"It was ADF, fleeing military pressure in (neighboring) North Kivu province, namely in the Beni region,” Gidi said.

"Our forces are already in the area and are in contact with the enemy."

According to media reports, the latest attacks occurred in a heavily forested area called Tshabi. A member of the Nyali community in Tshabi told AFP that, "People were killed with every sort of weapon, knives and guns.”

"Right now, the Congolese army, supported by local people, are still looking for victims in the forest,” he said.

"Seventeen people are listed as disappeared, but they have almost definitely been kidnapped,” he added.

The ADF is one of the foreign armed groups that trouble the eastern provinces of DR Congo.

The group has killed more than 1,000 civilians since the start of 2019, according to U.N. figures.