By Michael Chingarande
(News of The South) – African peacekeepers have escorted more than 1,000 minority Muslims fleeing attacks by mainly Christian militias in the Central African Republic to neighbouring Chad, police said.
“Not a single Muslim remains in Bossangoa,” a police source quoted by the AFP news agency said, referring to a northwestern town.
The sources added that the Muslims left for Chad on Thursday.
The refugees had gathered at a Quranic school and the Catholic Church’s premises in Bossangoa, fearing for their lives if they stayed on in the town, said the police source.
Large-scale violence between Christians and Muslims had been raging in Bossangoa and nearby Bouca since last September, part of nationwide unrest sparked by a March 2013 coup.
Thousands have been killed and around a quarter of the country’s 4.6 million people displaced, most of them Muslims, who make up around one-fifth of the overall population.
Muslims who lived peacefully alongside Christians for decades have abandoned entire regions since the conflict took on unprecedented ethnic and religious dimensions.
At least 150 people have lost their lives in the fighting in the Bossangoa region alone pitting former rebels of the Seleka movement that held power for 10 months against mainly Christian “anti-balaka” militias.
Comments
About Author
