Burundi attack condemned by UN

The UN Security Council strongly condemned a rebel offensive on Burundi’s capital which the United Nations said has killed up to 20 civilians, injured as many as 100 and displaced another 5,000 this week.

The council called on rebels from the National Liberation Forces, or FNL, “to put an immediate and unconditional end” to the offensive and enter serious negotiations with the transitional government without delay.

Civil war erupted in Burundi in October 1993 after Tutsi paratroopers assassinated the country’s first democratically elected president, Melchior Ndadaye, a member of the Hutu majority.

At least 200,000 people, mostly civilians, have died in the conflict.