Fiche du document numéro 13030

13030

Saturday April 9, 1994

19940409

Smerdon, Peter

1994-04-09ReutersForeignersStartEvacuation.pdf

89266

1994-04-09ReutersForeignersstartRwandaevacuationasrebelsclosein.html

Foreigners start Rwanda evacuation as rebels close in

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Reuters

Dépêche d'agence

EN

KIGALI, April 9 (Reuter) - French troops evacuated foreigners on
Saturday from Rwanda's capital where relief officials said tribal
slaughter and renewed civil war had killed tens of thousands of people.

Witnesses said three convoys of foreigners which left Kigali by road
had reached the relative calm of Rwanda's central African neighbour,
Burundi, late on Saturday.

Rebels of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) said a 4,000-strong force
was advancing on the capital on two fronts

They (troops) may arrive as early as before dawn on Sunday. But they
met strong resistance along the way, so this is not certain, said an
RPF official who asked not to be named.

The RPF official said rebel forces would reinforce a 600-strong
battalion already in Kigali and would engage government troops who have
gone on a rampage in the city.

We must destroy the capacity of this regime to kill and destroy, the
official said. They (government soldiers) have three options: join us,
stand aside, or fight us.

The official said the main RPF force would remain in the northern
region that it holds, mainly to mop up government forces resisting them
in that area.

In Washington, President Bill Clinton said he was deeply concerned
with the fate of Americans -- most of them teachers and missionaries --
caught in the escalating violence.

I am deeply concerned about the continuing violence in the central
African nation, Clinton said in his weekly radio address to the nation,
which was broadcast live from the Oval Office.

Fighting erupted in the former Belgian colony following Wednesday's
rocket attack in Kigali that killed President Juvenal Habyarimana and
his counterpart from Burundi.

State Department spokesman Michael McCurry said the situation in
Rwanda remained tense.

A Burundian journalist told Reuters by telephone in Nairobi dozens of
U.S. marines had arrived in the central African state to oversee
evacuation of American civilians from Rwanda.

Americans and Europeans have arrived here by road from the chaos of
Rwanda, journalist Deogratius Muvira said.

They were 172 people, travelling in 72 cars from Butare in southern
Rwanda, he said. Separately, 118 U.S. marines arrived in Burundi, the
first of a 330-strong force.

In Paris, the foreign ministry said French troops evacuated 43
nationals from Kigali by air and other rescue flights were planned.

A plane took off from Kigali a little more than an hour ago, a
ministry spokeswoman said. The operation is proceeding very well.

The Red Cross reported tens of thousands had been killed in a two-day
orgy of violence which pitted gangs of Hutu tribesmen, backed by
renegade army units, against Tutsi rivals accused of killing President
Habyarimana, a Hutu, last Wednesday.

Yesterday, we were talking about thousands of dead. Today we can start
with tens of thousands, Herve Le Guillouzic, medical coordinator of
the International Committee of the Red Cross, told Reuters.

He said corpses were everywhere -- in the houses, in the streets,
everywhere.

Reuters Television cameraman Mohamed Shaffi said he filmed one American
and one Red Cross convoy snaking their way through the hilly city
towards the main road to the Burundi capital.

It is extremely tense. Roadblocks are manned by large groups of youths
wielding knives and handgrenades and warning they will attack and kill
French and Belgians, Shaffi said.

Some 400 French troops flew into the city early on Saturday in three
military transports, but apparently failed to secure the airport before
venturing into the eerily-quiet city where a lull in fighting was
reported.

Belgian paratroopers, carrying tonnes of military equipment, were
supposed to land later but officials in Brussels said they might be
diverted to Burundi or Kenya. French radio reported their planes had
been unable to land after Rwandan troops opposed to their arrival
blocked the runway.

Colonel Luc Marchal, commander of Belgian forces serving with a
2,500-strong U.N. mission in the country, said government forces had
blocked the airport runway with fire trucks after the French troops
landed.

He said rebels and government forces were still fighting while aid
workers said heavy weapons were being used.

Paul Kagame, leader of the predominantly Tutsi rebel RPF, rejected a
new interim government and said his troops would attack and take the
city.

But new interim President Venat Theodore Sindikubwabo said that only
those who did not understand the constitution would dispute or oppose
his ascension to power.

A spokesman for the Belgian branch of Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF),
an international medical charity, said the rebels had launched an
attack on the northern town of Ruhengeri.

Gangs of Hutu youths manned roadblocks on the outskirts of Kigali and
threatened to kill any Belgians they found.

The Hutus accuse Belgium, the former colonial ru ler, of covertly
supporting the RPF which has its main office in Belgium.

(c) Reuters Limited 1994