Citation
PARIS, April 10 (Reuter) - France evacuated most of its nationals from
war-ravaged Rwanda on Sunday and said it would help flying other
endangered westerners to safety.
A Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said 525 of some 600 French residents in
the central African country had left, most of them from Kigali aboard
French military planes.
Spokeswoman Catherine Colonna said the airlift was halted as night fell
and would resume on Monday morning. France-2 television reporter
Philippe Boisserie, reporting from the airport, said later the airlift
was continuing.
The evacuation started at the weekend after tens of thousands of people
died in fighting and ethnic violence unleashed by the assassination of
Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana last week.
Cooperation Minister Michel Roussin said the evacuation mission
codenamed Amaryllis
, involving nearly 500 paratroopers and five
military transport planes, was operating smoothly.
Colonna said French planes flew out 400 French nationals and some
foreigners. Another 10 French people left on a United Nations plane and
115 left by road for Burundi and Zaire.
She said French soldiers rescued 88 children from an orphanage near
Kigali after the orphanage's nuns called for help. Some of the children
had been in the process of being adopted by French families.
Boisserie said grenade and rocket fire prevented a convoy of French
soldiers from reaching the French embassy in Kigali. But he did not
think the fire was aimed at French troops.
A first batch of French citizens was due to arrive in Paris late on
Sunday on a commercial flight after stopping over in either the Central
African Republic capital of Bangui or the Burundi capital of Bujumbura.
Roussin said the French forces will probably have a role to play
in
evacuating other westerners. Belgian officials said eight planes
carrying Belgian paratroopers landed at Kigali to help rescue 1,500
Belgian residents, the largest Western community in Rwanda.
Roussin, in charge of French policy in Africa, reiterated that French
troops would not intervene in fighting, largely along tribal lines,
between government and rebel troops.
The rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) was quoted as saying it was
prepared to attack French paratroopers if they intervened in the ethnic
conflict.
The rebels suspect France, which until recently had several hundred
soldiers in Rwanda, of siding with the Hutu majority. The RPF, with a
force of about 10,000 guerrillas, is predominantly of the minority but
formerly ruling Tutsi tribe.
A French priest was killed in northern Rwanda on Wednesday and two
French government workers were believed to have been killed in Kigali.
A third worker was missing.
France has always been neutral in this matter between the Hutus and
Tutsis,
Roussin said. This is a problem the Rwandans must settle
together.
However, Roussin acknowledged some Rwandans had escaped with French
nationals. There are very strong ties between some French and Rwandan
families,
he said.
About 10 members of the family of Habyarimana, killed when a rocket hit
his plane as it landed in Kigali last Wednesday, were reported to be on
the first French plane to leave the Rwandan capital on Saturday.
Roussin also said some Rwandan authorities, fearing slaughter, were
holed up in the French embassy in Kigali. We will continue to protect
them,
he said.
Philippe Gaillard, head of the International Red Cross in Rwanda, told
French radio he expected all volunteer aid groups to leave Rwanda by
Monday.
(c) Reuters Limited 1994
