Bishop Melchisedek Sikuli Paluku personally informed the Vatican agency Fides of the murder of Father Romano Kaindo, 50.
According to local Catholics, Father Kaindo was in a car driving toward the town. On reaching a bad stretch in the road, he slowed down and suddenly Rwandan rebels appeared from the bush and attacked him. The priest was shot with a rifle.
He was rushed to a small hospital run by nuns in Butembo. Authorities believe the attackers were looking for money. Father Kaindo was diocesan bursar.
Armed groups have been robbing people in northern Kivu and even battling one another.
Father Kaindo returned to Africa last year after studying canon law and economics at the Urban University in Rome and working for some years in a parish in Chiusi, central Italy.
