More than 1,000 people in Burundi participated in a government-backed demonstration in the capital, Bujumbura, Saturday to protest France’s proposal passed by U.N. Security Council to deploy U.N. police to the country.
Representatives of Burundi’s government and opposition began a mediated effort on Monday to end the country’s political violence. Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza, whose decision to run for election to a third term triggered the bloodshed, was invited but wasn’t present at the opening ceremony. Proper negotiations will start in January.
Burundi’s fighting sides are to meet on December 28 in Uganda to discuss the country’s deadly political unrest, Uganda’s defense minister said Saturday.
A team sent to investigate the ongoing crisis in Burundi received reports of torture, arbitrary killings, targeted assassinations, arbitrary arrests and detentions which are of “great concern,” the African Union said Tuesday.
Burundi’s political violence escalated Saturday as 28 people were found shot dead in three neighborhoods in the capital, a day after the government said an unidentified group carried out coordinated attacks on three military installations.
At least nine people were killed in an overnight attack at a bar in the latest violence in Burundi’s capital, witnesses said Sunday, as security forces went door-to-door to disarm civilians in neighborhoods seen as opposition strongholds.
Burundi may have slipped off the world’s attention, but the crisis that erupted in May when President Pierre Nkurunziza announced that he would seek a third term is far from being resolved.
Gunfire rang out in Burundi’s capital Sunday night following the killing of a feared military general who was a close ally of President Pierre Nkurunziza