Rebels move on presidential palace in Chad
Hundreds of rebels penetrated the capital of Chad today, clashing with government troops and moving on the presidential palace after a three-day advance across the Central African nation, officials and witnesses said. Looting, gunfire and explosions were reported.
Colonel Thierry Burkhard, a French military spokesman, said groups of rebels gathered outside the capital, N’Djamena, overnight before 1,000-1,500 fighters entered early this morning and spread through the city.
Chad’s ambassador to Ethiopia Cherif Mahamat Zene said Chad’s capital had not fallen and that President Idriss Deby is “fine” in his palace. He acknowledged rebels were in the city.
A spokesman for the biggest rebel group said that its forces had surrounded the presidential palace and that ’many’ government soldiers were defecting to the insurgents .
“Many in the military have rallied with the rebels,” said Mahamat Hassane Boulmaye of the Union of Forces for Democracy and Development. He was reached on a Sudanese mobile telephone number and said he was speaking from Chad’s border with Sudan.
The rebel force is believed to be a coalition of three groups, including the UFDD led by former diplomat Mahamat Nouri, who defected 16 months ago, and Timan Erdimi, a nephew of Mr Deby. They have long fought to overthrow Mr Deby, whom they accuse of corruption.
Mr Deby, himself a soldier, has suffered many defections in the past and morale is low in the army.
Mr Boulmaye claimed the rebels controlled 80% of Chad, but this could not be confirmed.
Ambassador Zene said: “The situation is under control. ... The head of state is fine in his palace. It’s true that there are some rebels who have entered the city, but to say the city has fallen is false.”
He said his information came from a telephone call with the defense minister in N’Djamena.
A leader of Chad’s main opposition alliance, which is unarmed and not associated with the rebels, said shooting broke out after rebels entered the city around 8am but appeared to die down about two hours later. Ibni Oumar Mahamat Saleh said about 12:45pm that there were no soldiers in his neighbourhood and state radio had gone off the air.
“At the moment we are not hearing any firing ... The rebels are in the city. Civilians are in the streets. They are watching what is happening,” said Mr Saleh.
The United Nations said it decided to evacuate all its staff from N’Djamena, and the French and American governments told their citizens to assemble in secure locations as witnesses reported looting, gunfire and explosions near government buildings.
France’s military has about 1,400 personnel in Chad, about 1,200 of those in the capital. Paris sent more troops late on Thursday to boost a long-time military presence in Chad. About 1,500 French citizens live there, most in N’Djamena.
The rebels had been advancing on the capital for three days in about 250 pickup trucks from the direction of the border with Sudan, some 510 miles to the east of N’Djamena.
Clashes broke out Friday morning near Massakori, about 30-50 miles north-east of N’Djamena and moved closer to the capital, said a French military spokesman. France-Info radio said helicopters bombarded rebel positions.
The 52-nation African Union, holding a summit in Ethiopia, said it would not recognise the rebels should they succeed in seizing power.
“If the rebellion succeeds, certainly we will excommunicate them from the African Union until normalcy and democratic institutions are restored ...,” said Tanzania’s President Jakaya Kikwete, the new AU head.
He said the African Union had selected Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi and Republic of Congo President Denis Sassou-Nguesso to try to broker peace there.
France, Chad’s former coloniser “firmly condemn the attempt to take power by force” said a statement from the French foreign affairs ministry. It called for peace and reconciliation and said France supports the African Union mediation effort.
France’s embassy in Chad sent messages over Radio France Internationale telling citizens to head to the Lycee Francais high school and two other locations in N’Djamena, a French diplomatic official said.
The US Embassy said in a bulletin on its website that any Americans seeking evacuation should immediately move to the embassy. State Department spokesman Karl Duckworth said the embassy had authorised the departure of nonessential personnel and family members.
The United Nations decided to pull staff out. “It’s been decided that the UN will temporarily evacuate all their remaining staff,” said William Spindler, spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. “We’re looking at the logistics and how it can be done. Since there is fighting going on, it might be difficult to carry it out.”
Mr Spindler said 51 UN staff were evacuated from N’Djamena to Cameroon overnight.
A man who answered the telephone at the German Embassy said it was very occupied organising evacuations.
In N’Djamena, a telephone operator at the Hotel le Meridien, a mile from the headquarters of President Deby, said gunfire and explosions had been resounding through the capital since 7am.
Rebels in more than a dozen vehicles drove past the Libya Hotel, which overlooks the parliament building, said a man who answered the telephone at that hotel.
“I saw more than 15 vehicles and they (the rebels) were firing into the air,” said the man.
He said he also watched looters go into a police station opposite the hotel, stealing chairs and throwing papers on the ground.
It appeared that Chad’s government might be getting less help from France than during previous rebel attempts to take the capital, said Henri Boshoff, a military analyst at the Institute for Security Studies in Pretoria, South Africa.
Previously “the French gave them intelligence using aerial reconnaissance and that allowed the Chad government to act” Mr Boshoff said. “But it looks like this time it’s too late, the rebels got too close to the city.”
The difference could be that former President Jacques Chirac had tried to project the image of France as a friendly protector on the African continent, and he led France during the previous coup attempts. The new president, Nicolas Sarkozy, has called for a “healthier relationship” saying it would not be business as usual with France’s old corrupt allies on the continent.
Chad, a French colony until 1960, has been convulsed by civil wars and invasions since independence, and the recent discovery of oil has only increased the intensity of the struggle for power in the largely desert country.
The most recent series of rebellions began in 2005 in the country’s east, occurring at the same time as the conflict in neighbouring Sudan’s western region of Darfur saw a rise in violence. One Chadian rebel group launched a failed assault on N’djamena, in April 2006.
The governments of Chad and Sudan repeatedly exchange accusations that one is backing the other’s rebel groups.
Mr Deby came to power at the head of a rebellion in 1990; he has won elections since, but none of the votes were deemed free or fair. He brought a semblance of peace after three decades of civil war and an invasion by Libya, but became increasingly isolated and members of his own family have joined Chad’s latest rebellion.
UN officials estimate that around 3 million people have been uprooted by conflicts in the region, including the fighting in Darfur, and rebellions in Central African Republic.
The renewed fighting led the EU to delay its peacekeeping mission in both Chad and neighbouring Central African Republic, which was due to be up and running early next month, said Commandant Dan Harvey, speaking at the EU military headquarters in Paris on Friday.
The force, known as EUFOR, is aimed at protecting refugees and people displaced by turmoil in their own countries.