- Title: BURUNDI: 18 CIVILIANS KILLED IN FIGHTING BETWEEN ARMY AND HUTU REBELS.
- Date: 2nd October 2000
- Summary: BUJUMBURA, BURUNDI (SEPTEMBER 29, 2000) (REUTERS) GV/PAN: MILITARY TRUCK HEADING TOWARD KAMENGE ON EMPTY STREET PEOPLE FLEEING KAMENGE MCU: (SOUNDBITE)(Swahili) LOCAL RESIDENT HASSINA MATOKI: "The soldiers told us to go back home, but we don't want to. There was gunfire all night long, we are scared. We saw people running away and we started running too." GV: KAMENGE AREA - DESTROYED HOUSE
- Embargoed: 17th October 2000 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: MATAKURA AND BUJUMBURA, BURUNDI
- Country: Burundi
- Topics: Conflict,General
- Reuters ID: LVA19NSZZDLOY2SZHULLHVKGEBFL
- Story Text: At least 18 civilians, among them two women and two
children, were killed during clashes between Burundis ethnic
Hutu rebels and the army on the outskirts of the capital on
Friday (September 29).
Thousands of civilians fled Burundi's suburb of
Kamenge on Friday
(September 29) after heavy fighting raged on there on Thursday
night (September 28).
Kamenge has always been the most tense place in the
capital. The poor Bujumbura suburb is the historic Hutu
stronghold. In 1995, Burundi's Tutsi led army fighting Hutu
rebels, shelled Kamenge, forcing the predominantly Hutu
civilian population to flee the area.
A rebuilding pregramme has been going on in Kamenge for
the last three years, but the latest outbreak of fighting
could lead to more loss of life and further destruction.
Bodies of 18 people, mostly young men, but also those of
two women and two babies, where discovered on Friday near a
house in the valley of Nyabagere river in Kamenge. The bodies
were discovered after a reported attack by Hutu rebels on a
nearby government military post earlier on Friday.
Local officials and some residents told reporters that
Hutu rebels had dragged civilians from their homes and shot
them in nearby fields. Other witnesses said hundreds of
civilians had fled Kamenge during the rebel attack, but were
forced to return home by government soldiers.
But Hutu areas are not the only ones to suffer from the
growing tension in the Burundian capital. Last week-end, Hutu
rebels reportedly killed 11 civilians in the largely Tutsi
surburb of Mutakura.
Acoording to locals in Mutakura, a large group of Hutu
rebels, some in military uniforms, some in civilian clothes,
armed with machine guns and machetes attacked the town on
September 23.
Around 200,000 people, most of them civilians, have died
in seven years of civil war between Hutu rebels and Burundi's
Tutsi-dominated army.
(dw/lh) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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