Fears Grow as U.N. Troops Begin Pullout From Rwanda

As U.N. forces retreated from Rwanda on Friday, fears mounted for the safety of hundreds of thousands of civilians trapped by violence that is estimated to have claimed up to 100,000 lives.

More than 400 U.N. peacekeepers flew out of the country Friday, ferried to Nairobi, Kenya, in Canadian transport planes. The U.N. Security Council voted Thursday to cut its original force of 2,500 in Rwanda to no more than 270.

Of special concern were more than 20,000 refugees from the tribal slaughter who have sought U.N. protection in the embattled Rwandan capital of Kigali. U.N. officials admitted that some of the refugee sites are little more than “death traps.”

The International Committee of the Red Cross, which said it had rarely witnessed a human tragedy on the scale of that in Rwanda, had urged the United Nations not to pull out its peacekeepers. It cited evidence of continuing massacres and pronounced the tiny country on the brink of famine. Human rights groups echoed the sentiment.

This latest convulsion of ethnic violence--in a country with a long history of conflict between the majority Hutus and the minority Tutsi--was set off when the presidents of Rwanda and neighboring Burundi were killed in a plane crash April 6.

There were reports of sporadic fighting Friday in Bujumbura, the capital of Burundi, which shares a similar Hutu-Tutsi ethnic makeup.

A new round of peace talks, meanwhile, was slated to begin today between the Hutu-dominated interim government and the Rwandan Patriotic Front rebels, who are predominantly from the Tutsi tribe, in the northern Tanzanian city of Arusha.

Previous U.N. efforts to bring the two sides together for a serious discussion of peace have failed, and the rebels have continued their slow advance on the capital.

U.N. officials reached in Kigali on Friday said thousands of rebel reinforcements are believed heading for the capital after they reportedly captured the town of Rwamagana, 25 miles to the east. The rebels now control a broad swath of northern Rwanda.

At least half a million people have fled their homes in Rwanda since fighting began. Yet fewer than 20,000 have crossed into neighboring countries, their traditional sanctuaries in times of trouble. Aid officials say most of the borders have been sealed by the Rwandan army.