{{Thousands of civilians have fled to the Central African Republic’s main international airport in order to escape from former rebel fighters, occupying the tarmac for 18 hours as a sign of protest, witnesses and officials say.}}<\/p>\n
The Central African Republic has descended into violence since Seleka rebels swept into Bangui in March, toppling President Francois Bozize and unleashing a wave of violence that new leader Michel Djotodia has failed to control.<\/p>\n
Residents of the Boeing quarter, located adjacent to the capital’s M’poko airport, began fleeing their homes on Tuesday night after Seleka fighters starting firing in the neighbourhood.<\/p>\n
Between 5,000 and 6,000 people gathered at the airport, according to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR).<\/p>\n
Peacekeepers present at the airport intervened on Wednesday, firing water cannon and tear gas to disperse the crowd after some protesters began throwing stones at them.<\/p>\n
By late afternoon, the runway had been cleared, government officials and peacekeepers said, but thousands returned to reoccupy it on Thursday.<\/p>\n
“There were no deaths, just a few wounded. But the situation is under control,” new security and public order minister Josue Binoua said of the clearing on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
The occupation of the airport kept several flights, including one run by Morocco’s national carrier Royal Air Maroc, from landing.<\/p>\n
A senior officer with the Central African regional peacekeeping mission based at the airport said the thousands of civilians who fled there overnight had refused to leave the tarmac.<\/p>\n
“They came here because they are afraid,” he said. The peacekeepers were forced to intervene to stop Seleka fighters from entering, he said.<\/p>\n
Residents of the Boeing neighbourhood said that what started as an evacuation had become a protest against the state of lawlessness.<\/p>\n
“Our presence here at the airport has one goal – to get the world’s attention. Because we are fed up with these Seleka,” said Antoine Gazama.<\/p>\n
Seleka banned from Bangui<\/p>\n
Seleka, a grouping of five rebel movements that Djotodia used to lead, has repeatedly raided rural villages and Bangui neighbourhoods under the pretext of searching for weapons caches and armed Bozize loyalists.<\/p>\n
Human rights groups say they are responsible for widespread looting, torture and summary executions.<\/p>\n
The security minister said the airport occupation forced President Djotodia to call an emergency meeting during which the government decided to ban Seleka from entering Bangui neighbourhoods.<\/p>\n
“Only the forces of order, notably the police and gendarmes, are authorised to ensure and reestablish order in the country and particularly in the city of Bangui,” Binoua said.<\/p>\n
Moments earlier, Djotodia had ordered Seleka forces based in the northern Bangui neighbourhood of Boy-Rabe to return to their bases and allow the police and gendarmes to move in.<\/p>\n
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{{Thousands of civilians have fled to the Central African Republic’s main international airport in order to escape from former rebel fighters, occupying the tarmac for 18 hours as a sign of protest, witnesses and officials say.}} The Central African Republic has descended into violence since Seleka rebels swept into Bangui in March, toppling President Francois […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2000047917,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[100],"byline":[170],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-10045","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-africa","byline-igihe"],"bylines":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"contributors":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"featured_image":{"id":2000047917,"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10045.jpg","alt":"","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","width":0,"height":0,"sizes":{"thumbnail":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10045.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10045.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium_large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10045.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10045.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"full":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10045.jpg","width":0,"height":0}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10045\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2000047917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10045"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=10045"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=10045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}