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MSF suspends operations in CAR
13/03/2008 14:17 - (SA)
Dakar - The French charity Medecins Sans Frontieres said on that Thursday it had suspended some operations in the Central African Republic after an unidentified gunman fired on one of its ambulances, killing a woman.
The attack took place on Monday in the northeast prefecture of Vakaga, which bordered Sudan's war-wracked Darfur region, the aid group said in a statement. The ambulance was carrying a 32-year-old woman and baby who had been discharged from a health clinic in the town of Gordil.
MSF head of mission Nicole Henze said: "We are shocked and outraged ... this attack is unacceptable. Our ambulance was clearly targeted."
MSF operated mobile health clinics in the remote, arid region and said it had temporarily barred them from operating outside of main towns.
Rebels 'backed' by Sudan
It was the second attack on the aid group in nine months. In June, rebels shot dead an MSF worker in the northwest.
Vakaga was the site of a brief rebel uprising launched in the spring of 2006. The rebels were pushed back by the French-backed army. The government had said the rebels were supported by neighbouring Sudan.
Regional experts had warned that conflicts in neighbouring Sudan and Chad might be spilling over the border into Central African Republic, but large swaths of the country had been wracked by a low-level internal conflict for years.
Much of the north was considered insecure, subject to banditry and sporadic attacks by the army and rebels that had left hundreds of villages burned to the ground.
The European Union was sending a 3 7000 peacekeeping mission to Central African Republic and neighbouring Chad to protect uprooted people in the region. The mission had been delayed by logistical problems and recent fighting in Chad.
Central African Republic had suffered decades of army revolts, coups and rebellions since it gained independence from France in 1960. Poor and landlocked, it was governed by President Francois Bozize, who came to power in a 2003 rebel war.
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