French Units Move Into Rwanda, Vow Not to Provoke Rebels

French marines and Foreign Legionnaires headed into the chaos of Rwanda on Thursday to try to stem the ethnic slaughter that has horrified the world. They pledged not to pick a fight with rebel forces who view them as enemies.

The commander of the small U.N. peacekeeping force in Rwanda said he hoped the French would stay away from front lines between troops of Rwanda’s Hutu-dominated government and the mainly Tutsi rebel movement.

A small group of French soldiers in armored vehicles met no opposition and was welcomed by locals after advancing several miles into western Rwanda, a military spokesman said in Paris.

The Rwandan army is believed to control the western third of the small Central African nation. The rebels have won control of the eastern two-thirds since the war resumed April 6 after a suspicious plane crash killed Rwanda’s Hutu president, who had reached a power-sharing accord with the Tutsi minority.

About 40 Foreign Legion paratroopers protected by helicopter gunships crossed the border from Bukavu, 60 miles south of Goma, the military said. Their goal was to secure a refugee camp near Cyangugu to protect 8,000 Tutsis from the widespread slaughter being inflicted on the tribe by Hutu militias.

The United Nations and aid groups estimate that hundreds of thousands of Rwandans have died in the past two months, most of them civilians.

A reconnaissance team of French marines also headed from Goma for the northwestern region of Gisenyi, French state radio reported, quoting an unidentified government source.

“The role is only to protect refugees,” said Col. Andre Schill, a French spokesman in Goma. He said French troops would use their weapons only if threatened or to protect refugees.

“We are not out here to make a new war, but to protect people. We are not here to shoot,” he told reporters.

The French government said it is sending about 2,500 soldiers and marines for the two-month mission that was authorized Wednesday by the U.N. Security Council as a stopgap until a larger, all-African peacekeeping force can be deployed.

Schill said 500 French soldiers already were in Goma, including marine infantrymen, supply troops and combat engineers. About 250 paratroopers were in Bukavu, he said.

French troops are turning the airport at Kisangani, Zaire, into an air base to support the mission, dubbed “Operation Turquoise.”

In Kigali, Rwanda’s capital, Maj. Gen. Romeo Dallaire, the Canadian commander of the 450 U.N. peacekeepers, said he had not been contacted by the French force but expected them to stay away from confrontation zones.

Dallaire cautioned against intervening in a civil war “when you do not have the consent of both sides.” He said he took seriously rebel threats to attack French troops.

Although the French government says the operation is a strictly humanitarian mission, the rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front is suspicious because French intervention blocked a rebel offensive in 1990.

“We have no doubt whatsoever that their intentions are far from being humanitarian,” Theogene Rudasingwa, secretary general of the Patriotic Front, told journalists in Paris.

The rebels’ representative in Paris, Jacques Bihozagara, said rebel forces would not seek out French troops.

But he warned the rebels would “treat them as invaders” if they did make contact.

French Prime Minister Edouard Balladur said Wednesday that he could not exclude the possibility of fighting, but his conditions for the operation indicated that French troops would not deploy near rebel areas.