BANGUI: African peacekeepers escorted 1,000 minority Muslims fleeing attacks by mainly Christian militias in the Central African Republic to neighbouring Chad, police said yesterday.
“Not a single Muslim remains in Bossangoa,” a police source said, referring to a northwestern town, adding that they left for Chad on Thursday. The refugees had gathered at a school and the Catholic Church’s premises in Bossangoa, fearing for their lives if they stayed on in the town, he said.
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. AFP
