BANGUI, (Reuters) – Christian militia attacked Muslim neighbourhoods in the capital of the Central African Republic yesterday, as France appealed to European partners for assistance in quelling months of religious violence in its former colony.
Pastor Antoine Mbao Bogo, the president of the local Red Cross, said his staff had recovered at least 29 bodies from northern neighbourhoods of Bangui following the clashes, which began late on Thursday.
The seizure of power by Seleka rebels in March unleashed a wave of looting, rapes and massaces by the Muslim gunmen, sparking reprisals by Christian self-defence militia known as anti-balaka.
More than 700,000 people have been displaced by the conflict, leading some to fear atrocities on the scale of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
France has deployed 1,600 troops under a U.N. mandate to protect civilians, following an escalation of the violence in early December in which hundreds of people were killed in Bangui under the gaze of African peacekeepers.
A semblance of calm had returned to the ramshackle riverside capital in recent days but fighting raged for several hours in the Muslim neighbourhoods of PK 5 and Fatima early on Friday following an assault by Christian militias.
“They tried to attack other parts of the city and even made an attempt to reach the centre of the town,” Guy-Simplice Kodegue, a spokesman for the interim government, told Reuters.
At a summit in Brussels, France’s President Francois Hollande appealed for help from European Union partners to restore order in the nation of 4.6 million people. He said EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton would propose options for a joint European mission, to be decided in late January. Poland had already sent 50 airmen to operate a C130 transport plane while Britain, Germany, Belgium, Spain and Holland were providing logistical support, he said.
“I am not asking that troops come to take part in military actions,” Hollande said. “What we need is a presence for specific missions such as protecting the airport, helping security, medical and humanitarian assistance.”
