Burundi Army Reportedly Took Part in Massacre

Refugees fleeing tribal violence in Burundi say that the army took part in the slaughter of thousands of people in that small, central African nation, a U.N. official said Tuesday.

At least 5,000 people have been reported killed in massacres during fighting between two tribes.

Code Cisse, the representative in Rwanda of the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, said that about 38,000 refugees have fled Burundi into neighboring Rwanda since the killing broke out Aug. 14. He said about 5,000 refugees continue to cross the border each day.

Most of those fleeing are members of the Hutu tribe, said Cisse, who spoke in a telephone interview after visiting border areas over the weekend.

Although the Hutu make up about 85% of Burundi’s 5 million people, they are subservient to the Tutsi, who make up the remaining 15% and dominate the government and army.

“We saw many people who had been injured by bullets and bayonets,” Cisse said. “They said they were fleeing because they didn’t want to get shot by the military.”

The Hutu People Liberation Party, an exiled opposition group, also has charged that Burundi’s military massacred thousands of the majority Hutus.

Burundi’s government denied the accusations and said 5,000 people were killed in a slaughter instigated by exiled Hutus who infiltrated Burundi to inflame anti-Tutsi sentiments.

“What the government did was restore peace,” said a communique issued Monday by Burundi’s foreign minister, Cyprien Mbonimpa.

The Hutu and the Tutsi are longtime enemies. After an abortive 1972 coup attempt in the former Belgian colony, the Tutsi massacred more than 100,000 Hutu, including most of the tribe’s educated class, according to human rights groups.

Western diplomats in Burundi’s capital, Bujumbura, say tribal disturbances took place earlier this month in the northern region, where last week’s reported slaughter occurred, but that the government believes it has restored order.

Most of the killings occurred around the remote farming communes of Ntega and Marangara in northern Burundi, an area that has been sealed off by the military.