The mayor of a town in eastern DR Congo, where inter-community conflict is common, said Thursday that the army shot five civilians dead, a claim the army strongly denied.

Gadi Mukiza, the mayor of Minembwe in South Kivu province, said "FARDC (Congolese army) soldiers shot at civilians. We do not know what is happening. It was in broad daylight."

"For the moment, we count five bodies," he told AFP.

The head of Minembwe's civil society, Rubibi Ruvuzangoma, said the dead were "four women and a man returning from the market".

An army spokesman in the region, Captain Dieudonne Kasereka, said it was "instead the army that was the victim of violence".

"On Wednesday, an armed civilian shot and killed a lieutenant who was walking peacefully in Minembwe before disappearing into the population," he said, adding that another soldier was wounded while getting water.

"These two incidents prove that the enemy is hiding in Minembwe's population."

The mountainous part of South Kivu province has suffered years of conflict between the local Banyamulenge -- Congolese of Tutsi background -- and the Babembe, Bafulero and Banyindu communities.

The disputes, often over local control of land and natural resources, regularly turn violent.

There have have been repeated drives to restore peace and stability, the latest organised by Kinshasa at the end of March, but none have stemmed the bloodshed.

Between February 2019 and June 2020, 128 people were killed in clashes between militias from communities living in the region's highlands, according to the United Nations Joint Human Rights Office.

More than 110,000 people have also been the displaced by the violence.

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