Marie-Celestin Karondwa died of his injuries after being beaten at his home in Butembo city, an Ebola hotspot, on Sunday.

Mourners have gathered in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to bury a local politician who his party said was beaten to death after he defended the government’s Ebola response on the radio.

The funeral for Marie-Celestin Karondwa was held in the city of Butembo on Wednesday.

Karondwa was attacked on Sunday at his home in Butembo, an Ebola hotspot in North Kivu province, according to his political party, the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDSP), which leads the DRC government. He died of his injuries at a local hospital.

“They beat him up and then set the house on fire,” his granddaughter, Sagesse Kavira, told The Associated Press news agency at the funeral.

The party said Karondwa was “an innocent victim for having defended the party’s position on the existence of the Ebola virus disease … and the threat it poses to the population”.

It was not immediately clear who carried out the attack, how many were involved or what motivated it.

The killing follows a series of attacks on health workers and other responders as the Central African nation battles its 17th and deadliest Ebola outbreak, which has so far recorded more than 8,000 cases, including nearly 4,000 deaths.

The current outbreak is caused by the Bundibugyo strain of the virus, for which there is no vaccine or specific treatment, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Researchers are testing potential candidates, the agency said.

The WHO said Ebola was present in provinces including Bas-Uele, Haut-Uele, Ituri, North Kivu, South Kivu, Sud Ubangi and Tshopo. It said Ituri remained the most affected.

Officials have tried to fight the outbreak through a village-based approach, but some residents have resisted, dismissing Ebola as a hoax amid deep distrust of the government.

Many believe the disease is a ruse for officials to siphon off money. Some refuse to report their symptoms due to disbelief or shame surrounding being an Ebola patient.

Responders say the scepticism has complicated their work, including in remote communities and newly emerging hotspots that are short of medical supplies and health workers.

The mistrust has been especially hard to overcome in rebel-held areas of eastern DRC, where decades of conflict and human rights abuses have left many residents wary of outsiders and state authorities.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO’s director general, has said the country’s east faces “a catastrophic collision of disease and conflict” hampering the response.