Violence in Central African Mutiny Appears to Be Easing

Renegade soldiers on Saturday terrorized a city strewn with corpses from a week-old mutiny, but the mayhem appeared to be losing strength as soldiers dropped their demand for the president’s resignation.

Opposition parties were weighing an invitation to join the government but indicated that they would accept only if President Ange Patasse agreed to hold elections in six months.

In a bid to win over groups that might otherwise support the mutineers, Patasse on Friday proposed opening his government to more opposition parties and creating a national conference to discuss the army’s concerns.

Patasse’s party and allied groups dominate the 85-member National Assembly, which was elected in 1993 in the country’s first multi-party vote.

“We have been asking President Patasse to open doors to the opposition, but he has repeatedly refused. Now that he has accepted . . . we cannot join unless he agrees to organize another series of presidential and legislative elections within a six-month period,” said Joseph Bendounga, head of the Democratic Council of Opposition Political Parties, the country’s main opposition coalition.

In the streets of the capital, Bangui, French troops deployed at the start of the uprising May 18 patrolled in tanks and gathered foreigners for evacuation.

Hundreds of French and about 100 Americans have been flown out on U.S. or French military aircraft.

France, the former colonial ruler, has about 2,500 citizens living in Central African Republic and 1,300 soldiers and military advisors stationed here permanently.

Stubborn mutineers continued to harass the capital, firing weapons into the air to scare off civilians whenever the French troops were out of sight.

French soldiers and presidential guards surrounded the presidential palace and government buildings in the looted, bullet-scarred capital.