Efforts to contain the latest outbreak of the deadly disease have been hampered by armed conflict in eastern DR Congo and cuts in foreign aid.
India’s Ministry of External Affairs made the announcement on Thursday as health officials grapple with a growing Ebola disease outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
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The joint statement said the decision was made “in view of the importance of ensuring the full participation and engagement of African leaders and stakeholders and the evolving public health situation on the continent”.
The announcement came as the first case of Ebola was confirmed in DR Congo’s South Kivu province, an area controlled by Rwanda-backed M23 rebels, a spokesman for the group said on Thursday.
Efforts to contain the latest outbreak of the deadly disease, which the World Health Organization has declared an international emergency, have been hampered by the DRC’s long-running conflicts, including conflict between the Congolese army and the M23.
The armed forces have never had to manage the response to an epidemic as serious as Ebola, which has killed more than 15,000 people in Africa over the past half century. The M23 said earlier this week it was committed to working with international partners to stop the outbreak, although the response has been complicated by the virus’s presence in densely populated urban areas in eastern DRC.
The new case was found in a rural area near the provincial capital Bukavu, which fell into the hands of M23 in February 2025. It signals the expansion of an outbreak that experts believe lasted for about two months in Ituri province, several hundreds of kilometers to the north, before being detected last week.
According to the M23 spokesperson, the case involves a person coming from “Kisangani”, a major town in eastern Tshopo province, where no Ebola infections have so far been recorded from the current outbreak.
“The individual concerned, a 28-year-old compatriot, unfortunately succumbed to the disease before the diagnosis could be confirmed,” the spokesperson said.
Congolese authorities have not yet commented on the reported case.
The latest outbreak in DRC, the 17th to affect the vast Central African country of more than 100 million people, is already suspected to have caused 139 deaths and 600 suspected cases, according to WHO. Two cases have also been confirmed in neighboring Uganda.
First responders say they lack basic supplies, which some have attributed to cuts in foreign aid by major international donors, particularly the United States.
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