Central Africa fears involvement in Chad troubles
April 30, 2006 (BANGUI) — The Central African Republic has closed its frontier with western Sudan where civil war has been raging, but now fears rebels from another neighbour, Chad, are being infiltrated by air via Sudan to set up rear bases on its territory.
And the government of the Central African Republic (CAR) here is now worried that the presence of these bases could drag its country into conflict between rebels and the government in Chad.
The regime of Chad President Idriss Deby Itno has been shaken by rebels determined to topple him.
Deby escaped a coup attempt on March 14. Having crushed this enemy he announced that he had finally put an end to “all the disorders.”
But two weeks later the rebels fought back as far as the gates of the capital and Idriss Deby had to be rescued by loyal troops.
Twice in the past week an unidentified cargo plane violated the airspace of the Central African Republic and touched down at the village of Tiringoulou, 800 kilometres (500 miles) northeast of the CAR capital Bangui near the borders with both Chad and Sudan, a military said.
During its first trip last Tuesday, the Russian-made Antonov An-32, using a registration “borrowed” from a United Nations transport, unloaded some 50 armed, well-equipped men wearing combat gear, who then melted into the countryside, said the source.
The following day, the same plane unloaded material on the same airstrip and again took off for an unknown destination.
These details were released in an official communique here last Wednesday and are evidently seen by the CAR authorities as linked to events that have shaken neighbouring Chad up north.
“Certain people would like to drag CAR into the conflict between our sister-republic Chad and rebels seeking to overthrow President Deby”, said the government communique.
“The plane came in from the east and there is no other country east of Chad other than Sudan,” Foreign Minister Jean-Paul Ngoupande said Friday, declining to speculate on who the unknown armed men were who had been flown into the country.
“For the moment we are treating them as unidentified persons who have landed on our territory in scandalous circumstances,” he said.
Unofficially, however, no one here is in any doubt about who they are.
“They’re clearly Chadian rebels who have come in from Sudan”, said a close aide of CAR President Francois Bozize.
Officials here also recalled the movement in early April of a column of some 20 pick-up trucks loaded with rebels belonging to the United Front for Change (FUC), which came in from Sudan and performed a short-cut through a nrtheastern corner of CAR territory to reach Chadian territory.
This brief incursion was revealed the day after the Chad government’s victory over FUC rebels at the gates of their capital N’Djamena.
It prompted the closure of the highly porous frontier between CAR and Sudan.
The air movements in the past week have now heightened concern here. The CAR government wishes to avoid, as it puts it,”aiding agression against Chad launched from its territory,” or allowing itself to be “dragged into this conflict.”
“Troop movements have already been observed in the region, but two aircraft landings in two days, that really intrigues us,” said one military source.
“It would be dangerous to let a Chadian rebel base set up in the region,” they said.
CAR officials also fear any kind of ganging up of Chadian rebels and pockets of opposition close to former CAR president Ange-Felix Patasse, who have been holed up in the north of the country for some months.
“These people present no threat, but if they ganged up with the Chadians that would change everything,” a military source commented.
To prevent the three-frontier zone in the northeast becoming a problem, CAR army reinforcements have been deployed there and French military aircraft based in Chad have begun carrying out surveillance flights over the territory, the source said.
(ST)