- Title: Burundi: President Buyoya Returns To Capital After Failed Coup
- Date: 19th April 2001
- Summary: Burundian President Pierre Buyoya returned to Bujumbura on April 19, 2001 after the leaders of the attempted take-over of April 18 surrendered to loyalist troops early in the morning and were taken into custody for questioning. Buyoya said that if the dissidents had succeeded the tortuous peace process to end the tiny central African country's civil war could have entirely disintegrated. About 40 soldiers, believed to be from the central African country's politically dominant Tutsi minority and calling themselves the National Youth Patriotic Front, seized the state radio station and announced their rebellion. But within hours, officers loyal to Tutsi President Pierre Buyoya surrounded the building and opened negotiations with the coup leaders inside to persuade them to surrender. Analysts said the putsch attempt exposed doubts among Tutsis over a peace process aiming to end the seven-year war pitting the Tutsi-led government against rebels of the Hutu majority. Buyoya left Gabon in West Africa after holding peace talks with Burundi's ethnic Hutu rebels brokered by Gabon's President Omar Bongo.
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- Location: BURUNDI BUJUMBURA
- Reuters ID: LDL0012FDRQLB
- Aspect Ratio: 4:3
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- Copyright Holder: Reuters Archive
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