Aucun coup de feu n'a été tiré mais les soldats français ont fait état de tensions avec les miliciens hutu qui battent la campagne armés de gourdins et de machettes

27 juin 1994

19940627

13:00:00

CEST

Journal de 13 heures [3:13] [Extraits]

Aucun coup de feu n'a été tiré mais les soldats français ont fait état de tensions avec les miliciens hutu qui battent la campagne armés de gourdins et de machettes

Comme au Rwanda, au Burundi, la France est suspectée de favoriser les Hutu majoritaires dans la capitale.

1994-06-27Midifr2.mp4

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France 2

INA

Journal télévisé

FR

- They walked to the top of the hill where the priest had set up the altar. They prayed for the first time in two months thanks to the protection of the French army.
- Throughout the weekend the paratroopers multiplied the patrols and in each village the same scenes were repeated: warm welcome from the Hutu and Tutsi population, slogans of welcome to France.
- No shots were fired but the French soldiers reported tensions with the Hutu militiamen who roam the countryside armed with clubs and machetes. French soldiers identified and acted in five refugee camps. Everyone's needs need to be assessed as quickly as possible. Not all are out of the woods.
- We already know that the sanitary condition of the camps is far from satisfactory. And we also know that these refugees still live in fear. A fear fueled by the ever-increasing presence of people fleeing areas close to the front line.
- On the Zairian bases where the French are positioned, troops and logistics continue to arrive. Today the military are waiting for 40 tons of humanitarian aid provided by the French government.
- Massacres, refugee camps, Hutu or Tutsi rivalries, in Burundi they also know all that. Burundi went through its own dark period last October: 125,000 dead, half Hutu, half Tutsi.
- But today it is the French community that fears for its safety. The 1,000 French people in Burundi are following the progress of Operation Turquoise in Rwanda very closely.
- In Burundi, Rwandan refugees are now mixing with displaced Burundians who also fled the massacres.
- As in Rwanda, in Burundi, France is suspected of favoring the Hutu majority in the capital. Majority also within the army. From Paris no one came to explain the humanitarian nature of the military intervention.
- Bujumbura does not look like Kigali today. But French expatriates in Burundi know that they are now vulnerable.