Orphans Reported Slain in Rwanda

Heavy shelling battered Rwanda’s capital in a surge of fighting between Tutsi rebels and Hutu-led government troops Tuesday, and new reports of ethnic butchery in the countryside said militiamen killed 34 orphans and Red Cross workers.

A British-based aid group, Oxfam, pleaded with the United Nations to send troops back into Rwanda to protect civilians from the slaughter that has raged unchecked for nearly a month.

At least 100,000 Rwandans have been killed since Rwanda’s president, a member of the majority Hutu ethnic group, died in a mysterious plane crash April 6 in the capital, Kigali.

But Oxfam’s director, David Bryer, said reports from his colleagues working with Rwandan refugees suggest that up to 500,000 people may have been slain, most of them minority Tutsis.

In a new example of Rwanda’s savagery, the International Red Cross reported Tuesday that 21 orphans were slain by militiamen in Butare on Sunday, along with 13 Rwandan Red Cross workers who tried to protect them.

The U.N. spokesman in Kigali reported heavy shelling in the capital. He said by telephone that three U.N. peacekeepers were wounded, but he had no details about other casualties.