Rebels take 150 people hostage

2008-03-29 09:18

New York - Rebel fighters attacked villages in the Central African Republic, raping women and taking 150 hostages, including 55 children, United Nations officials here and in Bangui said on Friday.

A UN investigation into attacks on four CAR villages between February 09 and March 10 found that men and women were tied at the hips with rope and forced to march from their homes carrying stolen food and supplies.

All 55 of the kidnapped children, many of them younger than 15, were still missing, although close to 40 adults had been released, the officials said.

An unofficial UN report issued in Bangui earlier on Friday said that the atrocities "bear all the hallmarks of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA)", a notorious rebel movement in neighbouring Uganda.

"In as much as we can confirm that the attacks actually took place, we were unable to identify who the perpetrators were, partly because of the fact that several armed groups with similar modus operandi are present in the region," the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in a statement on Friday.

Indiscriminate violence

OCHA said that eyewitnesses and victims told the UN team that some 300 armed men had attacked the villages of Bambouti, Gbassigbiri, Ligoua and Obob, along the Central African Republic's border with the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan.

"These acts of indiscriminate violence, hitting innocent men, women and young children, are extremely worrying and a grave violation of human rights,' the office said.

The CAR government had confirmed that fighters entered the country, although it was unable to positively confirm they were LRA. Uganda had said it has "reliable information" the fighters were from the LRA.

LRA chief Joseph Kony is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

In late February, Uganda said it had signed an accord with the LRA, which would see the armed militia group disarm, demobilise and be reintegrated into society.

This would be the last step before a formal peace accord scheduled for April, although it had not been signed by Kony.

The region where the attacks took place, which had a population of some 60 000, was relatively peaceful compared with the north of CAR, where conflicts had created 300 000 refugees.

However, it was still lawless and afflicted by roaming armed groups, including heavily-armed Sudanese poachers.

- AFP