- Title: CAR: New fighting breaks out in Central African Republic, four killed
- Date: 25th April 2014
- Summary: BANGUI, CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC (APRIL 25, 2014) (REUTERS) CROWD GATHERED IN FRONT OF PRIME MINISTER'S OFFICE CROWD STANDING AROUND BODY OF CENTRAL AFRICAN SOLDIER POLICE TRYING TO CALM DOWN CROWD CROWD FOLLOWING POLICE AS THEY TRY TO TRANSPORT BODY TO MORGUE PEOPLE PLACING BODY IN POLICE CAR (SOUNDBITE) (French) DEAD SOLDIER'S YOUNGER BROTHER, HILER MBETI, SAYING: "Aro
- Embargoed: 10th May 2014 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Central African Republic
- Country: Central African Republic
- Topics: General
- Reuters ID: LVA7PVCD2ESHUD742TEF5ANPBHBM
- Story Text: Angry Bangui residents brought the body of a Central African soldier, killed overnight in heavy gunfire, to the prime minister's office on Friday (April 25), where hundreds had gathered in pouring rain to protest the ongoing violence.
The heavy shooting broke out overnight in Muslim suburbs of Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic, and health workers reported at least four dead in the new outbreak of violence.
Only isolated incidents of fighting have been reported in the capital this month and many French and African Union forces have fanned out into the surrounding countryside in an attempt to curb inter-communal clashes elsewhere.
Most of the Muslims who once lived in Bangui, in the south of the former French colony, have now fled towards the northern border with Chad, creating a de facto partition.
But in a break from the relative calm in Bangui, a Reuters witness heard heavy weapons fire overnight and sporadic shooting in the mostly Muslim suburbs of PK-5 and PK-3.
The mutilated body of the soldier's wife was also brought to the hospital, according to a Reuters witness. It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the killings.
But the crowd of Christian residents and relatives of victims blamed it on Muslim attackers.
"They came to his house at around 10pm, they broke down the gate and they shot three bullets in his abdomen, and they took his girlfriend, they cut her throat and cut her breast in three. They also shot at her youngest girl, who fled but she's now in the MSF hospital at the airport. In the neighbourhood right now we are fed up with the Muslims, we don't have any security in the neighbourhood," said Hiler Mbeti, the dead soldier's younger brother.
Health officials at the Bangui hospital said they had treated at least 13 people with gunshot wounds from the same neighbourhoods. Two people killed by gunshot wounds were also brought in, they said.
Colonel Gilles Jaron, a French military spokesman, said that French troops were fired on at a junction near the Muslim neighbourhoods.
Two thousand French soldiers and about 6,000 African Union forces are struggling to contain a conflict that erupted after the mostly Muslim Seleka rebels seized power a year ago in the majority Christian state.
Since the Selaka rebels were forced to step aside in January, attacks on Muslims have intensified and the United Nations has reported a "cleansing" of Muslims from the country's west. About 1 million have fled their homes and thousands have died, according to the UN. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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