Burundi Troops Battle Gunmen in Southwest
Troops in Burundi battled a nearly 100-strong force of fighters, a local governor said, amid fears that violence is spreading in the troubled nation
Nairobi (AFP) - Troops in Burundi battled a nearly 100-strong force of fighters, a local governor said Thursday, amid fears that violence is spreading in the troubled nation.
Two gunmen have been killed and 11 captured in clashes since Tuesday in the southwestern Rumonge district, said governor Juvenal Bigirimana after a gang of 80 to 100 men entered the town of Burambi, some 120 kilometres (75 miles) south of the capital Bujumbura.
"The security forces went to meet them, there were clashes that left two dead," Bigirimana said, adding that troops had seized mortars, rifles and machine-guns.
Burundi descended into violence in April after President Pierre Nkurunziza launched a successful bid for a third consecutive term in office, despite concerns over the legality of such a move.
While there have been near daily gun battles in the capital, attacks are now taking place in other parts of the country too.
Burundi's government blames the attacks on "armed criminals", but the United Nations has warned that the small central African country risks sliding back into civil war as violence continues.
Burundi plunged into civil war on ethnic lines between majority Hutus and minority Tutsis in 1993, at a cost of an estimated 300,000 lives by the end of the conflict in 2006.
Nkurunziza, an ex-rebel and born-again Christian who believes he has divine backing to rule, won a third term in office in July, in spite of the concerns.
Museveni Could Be Blamed If War Erupts Burundi
Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni and the East African Community could share in the blame if full-scale war breaks out in Burundi, a senior US official said on Wednesday.
The Ugandan leader's campaign for re-election next year has "very much distracted" him from his assigned role as EAC mediator of the Burundi crisis, Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Linda Thomas-Greenfield told a US Senate panel.
Urgent and closely focused attention is needed to quell Burundi's internal conflict, the US diplomat said. But the EAC's efforts to promote negotiations "have not borne fruit," she added.
"We hope to see dialogue initiated in the very near future," Ms Thomas-Greenfield remarked. "If it is not, and the crisis deteriorates further, possibly into full-scale war, I fear that President Museveni and the EAC could end up being partially blamed, given the lengthy delays in getting the process started."
Political tensions within the EAC have also impeded mediation, she said. Competing interests between Burundi and Rwanda and between Rwanda and Tanzania "have caused the EAC to not be as effective as they might have been," Ms Thomas-Greenfield said in remarks to a US Senate subcommittee on Africa.
Senator Jeff Flake, chairman of that panel, observed in his own comments that Mr Museveni might "find it hard to speak with much credibility" on the crisis precipitated by the Burundian president's decision to seek a third five-year term in office. The Ugandan leader has been in power for nearly three decades and aims to remain in charge for another five years, Senator Flake noted.
The US wants the African Union to take over the mediation effort from the EAC, Assistant Secretary Thomas-Greenfield said. "We're hopeful the AU will become more actively engaged in the process and take this burden away from President Museveni," she told the Senate panel.
The State Department's top Africa official also took note of reports that Rwanda is recruiting Burundian refugees with the possible aim of launching an armed insurgency inside Burundi.
The US has encouraged the Rwandan government to investigate those reports, Ms Thomas-Greenfield said. Washington is also urging Rwanda to become "more pro-active" in the peace process, she added.
While acknowledging "warning signs" that the conflict in Burundi could take on an ethnic character, Ms Thomas-Greenfield disputed assertions that Hutu-Tutsi violence is imminent.
Aimed at President Pierre Nkurunziza
"The ethnic part of this conflict has not taken root yet," she said. "There is some militarisation developing," but divisions between Hutu and Tutsi are "not as sharp as they might become," she commented. "The military has particularly avoided that," Ms Thomas-Greenfield noted.
Most of her criticisms were aimed President Pierre Nkurunziza, who, she said, is responsible for "a decade of irresponsible governance and failure to alleviate poverty in Burundi."
But Ms Thomas-Greenfield also admonished elements of the opposition. Their resort to violence, she said, threatens to further destabilise Burundi.
"While Nkurunziza’s cynical attempts to treat all of those opposed to his actions as coup plotters must be rejected, it is equally important for those opposition members who have taken up arms to renounce violence and fully commit themselves to reaching a political consensus for the way forward," she declared.
A comparatively pro-government position was put forward at the same Senate subcommittee session by Sixte Vigny Nimuraba, a Burundian who works as director of a violence-prevention at a US university.
"People in the countryside do not care about president terms or the nuances of constitutional law,: Mr Nimuraba told the senators. "What they remember is that there has been a popular president who does community service with them and who plays soccer with them. The capital city is the place where the political classes live."
Mr Nimuraba also suggested that world powers may be contributing to circumstances underlying the conflict in Burundi.
"There is an underreported cold war competition between the major powers -- China and Russia on one side and the West on the other," he said. "Unexploited mineral resources like nickel and uranium play a major role in that commercial conflict."
Seven killed in Burundi violence over Nkurunziza
By Editor
December 11, 2015 1:29 am
SEVEN more people were killed in Burundi’s capital, Bujumbura, in violence associated with turmoil over President Pierre Nkurunziza’s extension of his term in office, witnesses said on Wednesday.
The international community has warned that the Central African country could slide into chaos if the killings continue. The United Nations said at least 240 people have been killed since April when Nkurunziza’s candidacy was announced.
Men in police uniforms pulled five people from their houses in Cibitoke neighborhood and shot them dead on Wednesday morning, resident, Salima Bukuru, said. Their bodies were left on the roadside, she said.
“That one works for a company which processes soap. He had just returned home from the night shift when they came for him. They beat him as they pulled him out of the house,” Bukuru said, pointing at a body among the group of five bloody corpses on the side of the street in Cibitoke.
“I asked why they were beating him and they started to beat me,” she said.
Rights activist, Vital Nshimiyimana, said some of the five murdered had just been released from prison where they had been held for months after being arrested for protesting against Nkurunziza’s third term in office.
“The killings were predetermined by the police,” Nshimiyimana said.
About 100 people who opposed Nkurunziza’s bid to extend his tenure were released on Tuesday.
Another person was shot dead in the afternoon in the Jabe neighborhood, while another was killed in Bwiza by people in police uniform on Tuesday night.
UN Warns of Genocide in Burundia
New York – The United Nations warned on Tuesday that violence in Burundi could degenerate into genocide, and stressed the urgent need for a political dialogue.
The warning came on the eve of the first international day set aside by the UN General Assembly to commemorate the victims of genocide and work to prevent its recurrence.
Adama Dieng, a special UN advisor for the prevention of genocide, told reporters he was worried that both the government and the opposition were manipulating ethnic tensions in Burundi, pitting Hutus and Tutsis against each other. “I’m not saying that tomorrow there will be a genocide in Burundi but there is a serious risk that if we do not stop the violence this may end with a civil war and following such a civil war anything is possible,” he said.
He recalled Burundi’s history of internal violence, including a civil war that raged from 1995 to 2003, and called for “sincere and inclusive dialogue. We can’t solve the problem by sending military troops,” he warned.
On September 12, the UN Security Council adopted a French-sponsored resolution authorising possible deployments of peacekeepers to Burundi.
For now, however, the United Nations plans to send only a small team led by its envoy to Burundi, Jamal Benomar, to push for a political dialogue.
The situation has grown worse since the disputed re-election of President Pierre Nkurunziza to a third term on July 21, with armed groups and government security forces facing off against each other in violent clashes.
Since April, hundreds of people have been killed and more than 200,000 have fled the country.
– AFP
Body Count Rises as Crisis Continues in Burundi
Mohammed Yusuf
December 10, 2015 10:28 AM
NAIROBI, KENYA
Efforts to resolve Burundi's political crisis remain stalled, five months after President Pierre Nkurunziza won a controversial re-election. Meanwhile, residents of the capital continue to wake up to fresh bodies on the streets in the mornings.
Another night in Burundi’s capital, Bujumbura, as the sound of gunfire rings across the city. Most of the clashes are between police and armed vigilantes.
When day breaks, it's time for the residents to count the dead. Seven people were killed on Wednesday, adding to the toll of at least 240 who have already died since April.
Residents told VOA the daily violence has become part of their lives, and that they feard for worse.
President was re-elected in July, but his critics insist he violated the constitution and the Arusha Accord, which ended the country’s civil war.
Both documents limit the presidents to two terms in office. Nkurunziza's supporters said his first term didn't count against the limit, as he was elected by parliament, not popular vote.
The United Nations, European Union and other bodies have called on Burundi's government to hold talks with the opposition.
In an interview with VOA Thursday, Foreign Affairs Minister Alain Nyamitwe commented on the consultation they had this week with the EU.
“They said they have not frozen the cooperation with us but that they were considering additional measures in case our dialogue with stakeholders did not yield positive results. We are hopeful that the dialogue we’ve had plus the work we are going to undertake from now are going to yield positive results which will not warrant any other negative measures,” said Nyamitwe.
Pancrase Cimpanye is deputy spokesman of Burundi's opposition alliance CNARED that includes members of civil society and political parties. He is discouraged with the progress of efforts to resolve the crisis.
“When you need to negotiate, you need to negotiate with your enemy, not with your friends. If they are trying to organize a dialogue inside Burundi, it means that they want to dialogue between friends, so it's not helpful,” he said.
The opposition alliance still insists the president should resign and make way for a interim government.
“We need first to have a transitional government maybe for one or two years. It's up to the transitional government to prepare fair election in a peaceful situation. Right now it’s quite impossible,” said Cimpanye.
The East African Community regional bloc appointed President Yoweri Museveni to facilitate talks between the government and the opposition, but many fear the Ugandan election due to be held early 2016 have distracted him.
U.S. envoy to the Great Lakes region Thomas Perriello said Burundians have solved problems through dialogue before.
“We know from Burundi’s own history that dialogue has worked in the past. The foundation of the Arusha Accord we believe has been successful in building a decade of peace in Burundi and that’s one of the things we have to remember for all of the scariness of the situation, that up until a year ago it was in many ways a success story,” he said.
The African Union has launched a fact-finding mission to Burundi to investigate human rights violations and other abuses against Burundi civilians.
The investigators then will give its finding to the AU Peace and Security Council.
Nairobi (AFP) - Troops in Burundi battled a nearly 100-strong force of fighters, a local governor said Thursday, amid fears that violence is spreading in the troubled nation.
Two gunmen have been killed and 11 captured in clashes since Tuesday in the southwestern Rumonge district, said governor Juvenal Bigirimana after a gang of 80 to 100 men entered the town of Burambi, some 120 kilometres (75 miles) south of the capital Bujumbura.
"The security forces went to meet them, there were clashes that left two dead," Bigirimana said, adding that troops had seized mortars, rifles and machine-guns.
Burundi descended into violence in April after President Pierre Nkurunziza launched a successful bid for a third consecutive term in office, despite concerns over the legality of such a move.
While there have been near daily gun battles in the capital, attacks are now taking place in other parts of the country too.
Burundi's government blames the attacks on "armed criminals", but the United Nations has warned that the small central African country risks sliding back into civil war as violence continues.
Burundi plunged into civil war on ethnic lines between majority Hutus and minority Tutsis in 1993, at a cost of an estimated 300,000 lives by the end of the conflict in 2006.
Nkurunziza, an ex-rebel and born-again Christian who believes he has divine backing to rule, won a third term in office in July, in spite of the concerns.
Museveni Could Be Blamed If War Erupts Burundi
Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni and the East African Community could share in the blame if full-scale war breaks out in Burundi, a senior US official said on Wednesday.
The Ugandan leader's campaign for re-election next year has "very much distracted" him from his assigned role as EAC mediator of the Burundi crisis, Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Linda Thomas-Greenfield told a US Senate panel.
Urgent and closely focused attention is needed to quell Burundi's internal conflict, the US diplomat said. But the EAC's efforts to promote negotiations "have not borne fruit," she added.
"We hope to see dialogue initiated in the very near future," Ms Thomas-Greenfield remarked. "If it is not, and the crisis deteriorates further, possibly into full-scale war, I fear that President Museveni and the EAC could end up being partially blamed, given the lengthy delays in getting the process started."
Political tensions within the EAC have also impeded mediation, she said. Competing interests between Burundi and Rwanda and between Rwanda and Tanzania "have caused the EAC to not be as effective as they might have been," Ms Thomas-Greenfield said in remarks to a US Senate subcommittee on Africa.
Senator Jeff Flake, chairman of that panel, observed in his own comments that Mr Museveni might "find it hard to speak with much credibility" on the crisis precipitated by the Burundian president's decision to seek a third five-year term in office. The Ugandan leader has been in power for nearly three decades and aims to remain in charge for another five years, Senator Flake noted.
The US wants the African Union to take over the mediation effort from the EAC, Assistant Secretary Thomas-Greenfield said. "We're hopeful the AU will become more actively engaged in the process and take this burden away from President Museveni," she told the Senate panel.
The State Department's top Africa official also took note of reports that Rwanda is recruiting Burundian refugees with the possible aim of launching an armed insurgency inside Burundi.
The US has encouraged the Rwandan government to investigate those reports, Ms Thomas-Greenfield said. Washington is also urging Rwanda to become "more pro-active" in the peace process, she added.
While acknowledging "warning signs" that the conflict in Burundi could take on an ethnic character, Ms Thomas-Greenfield disputed assertions that Hutu-Tutsi violence is imminent.
Aimed at President Pierre Nkurunziza
"The ethnic part of this conflict has not taken root yet," she said. "There is some militarisation developing," but divisions between Hutu and Tutsi are "not as sharp as they might become," she commented. "The military has particularly avoided that," Ms Thomas-Greenfield noted.
Most of her criticisms were aimed President Pierre Nkurunziza, who, she said, is responsible for "a decade of irresponsible governance and failure to alleviate poverty in Burundi."
But Ms Thomas-Greenfield also admonished elements of the opposition. Their resort to violence, she said, threatens to further destabilise Burundi.
"While Nkurunziza’s cynical attempts to treat all of those opposed to his actions as coup plotters must be rejected, it is equally important for those opposition members who have taken up arms to renounce violence and fully commit themselves to reaching a political consensus for the way forward," she declared.
A comparatively pro-government position was put forward at the same Senate subcommittee session by Sixte Vigny Nimuraba, a Burundian who works as director of a violence-prevention at a US university.
"People in the countryside do not care about president terms or the nuances of constitutional law,: Mr Nimuraba told the senators. "What they remember is that there has been a popular president who does community service with them and who plays soccer with them. The capital city is the place where the political classes live."
Mr Nimuraba also suggested that world powers may be contributing to circumstances underlying the conflict in Burundi.
"There is an underreported cold war competition between the major powers -- China and Russia on one side and the West on the other," he said. "Unexploited mineral resources like nickel and uranium play a major role in that commercial conflict."
Seven killed in Burundi violence over Nkurunziza
By Editor
December 11, 2015 1:29 am
SEVEN more people were killed in Burundi’s capital, Bujumbura, in violence associated with turmoil over President Pierre Nkurunziza’s extension of his term in office, witnesses said on Wednesday.
The international community has warned that the Central African country could slide into chaos if the killings continue. The United Nations said at least 240 people have been killed since April when Nkurunziza’s candidacy was announced.
Men in police uniforms pulled five people from their houses in Cibitoke neighborhood and shot them dead on Wednesday morning, resident, Salima Bukuru, said. Their bodies were left on the roadside, she said.
“That one works for a company which processes soap. He had just returned home from the night shift when they came for him. They beat him as they pulled him out of the house,” Bukuru said, pointing at a body among the group of five bloody corpses on the side of the street in Cibitoke.
“I asked why they were beating him and they started to beat me,” she said.
Rights activist, Vital Nshimiyimana, said some of the five murdered had just been released from prison where they had been held for months after being arrested for protesting against Nkurunziza’s third term in office.
“The killings were predetermined by the police,” Nshimiyimana said.
About 100 people who opposed Nkurunziza’s bid to extend his tenure were released on Tuesday.
Another person was shot dead in the afternoon in the Jabe neighborhood, while another was killed in Bwiza by people in police uniform on Tuesday night.
UN Warns of Genocide in Burundia
New York – The United Nations warned on Tuesday that violence in Burundi could degenerate into genocide, and stressed the urgent need for a political dialogue.
The warning came on the eve of the first international day set aside by the UN General Assembly to commemorate the victims of genocide and work to prevent its recurrence.
Adama Dieng, a special UN advisor for the prevention of genocide, told reporters he was worried that both the government and the opposition were manipulating ethnic tensions in Burundi, pitting Hutus and Tutsis against each other. “I’m not saying that tomorrow there will be a genocide in Burundi but there is a serious risk that if we do not stop the violence this may end with a civil war and following such a civil war anything is possible,” he said.
He recalled Burundi’s history of internal violence, including a civil war that raged from 1995 to 2003, and called for “sincere and inclusive dialogue. We can’t solve the problem by sending military troops,” he warned.
On September 12, the UN Security Council adopted a French-sponsored resolution authorising possible deployments of peacekeepers to Burundi.
For now, however, the United Nations plans to send only a small team led by its envoy to Burundi, Jamal Benomar, to push for a political dialogue.
The situation has grown worse since the disputed re-election of President Pierre Nkurunziza to a third term on July 21, with armed groups and government security forces facing off against each other in violent clashes.
Since April, hundreds of people have been killed and more than 200,000 have fled the country.
– AFP
Body Count Rises as Crisis Continues in Burundi
Mohammed Yusuf
December 10, 2015 10:28 AM
NAIROBI, KENYA
Efforts to resolve Burundi's political crisis remain stalled, five months after President Pierre Nkurunziza won a controversial re-election. Meanwhile, residents of the capital continue to wake up to fresh bodies on the streets in the mornings.
Another night in Burundi’s capital, Bujumbura, as the sound of gunfire rings across the city. Most of the clashes are between police and armed vigilantes.
When day breaks, it's time for the residents to count the dead. Seven people were killed on Wednesday, adding to the toll of at least 240 who have already died since April.
Residents told VOA the daily violence has become part of their lives, and that they feard for worse.
President was re-elected in July, but his critics insist he violated the constitution and the Arusha Accord, which ended the country’s civil war.
Both documents limit the presidents to two terms in office. Nkurunziza's supporters said his first term didn't count against the limit, as he was elected by parliament, not popular vote.
The United Nations, European Union and other bodies have called on Burundi's government to hold talks with the opposition.
In an interview with VOA Thursday, Foreign Affairs Minister Alain Nyamitwe commented on the consultation they had this week with the EU.
“They said they have not frozen the cooperation with us but that they were considering additional measures in case our dialogue with stakeholders did not yield positive results. We are hopeful that the dialogue we’ve had plus the work we are going to undertake from now are going to yield positive results which will not warrant any other negative measures,” said Nyamitwe.
Pancrase Cimpanye is deputy spokesman of Burundi's opposition alliance CNARED that includes members of civil society and political parties. He is discouraged with the progress of efforts to resolve the crisis.
“When you need to negotiate, you need to negotiate with your enemy, not with your friends. If they are trying to organize a dialogue inside Burundi, it means that they want to dialogue between friends, so it's not helpful,” he said.
The opposition alliance still insists the president should resign and make way for a interim government.
“We need first to have a transitional government maybe for one or two years. It's up to the transitional government to prepare fair election in a peaceful situation. Right now it’s quite impossible,” said Cimpanye.
The East African Community regional bloc appointed President Yoweri Museveni to facilitate talks between the government and the opposition, but many fear the Ugandan election due to be held early 2016 have distracted him.
U.S. envoy to the Great Lakes region Thomas Perriello said Burundians have solved problems through dialogue before.
“We know from Burundi’s own history that dialogue has worked in the past. The foundation of the Arusha Accord we believe has been successful in building a decade of peace in Burundi and that’s one of the things we have to remember for all of the scariness of the situation, that up until a year ago it was in many ways a success story,” he said.
The African Union has launched a fact-finding mission to Burundi to investigate human rights violations and other abuses against Burundi civilians.
The investigators then will give its finding to the AU Peace and Security Council.
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