MONDAY, 8.30AM
HEAVY fighting has resumed in Congo-Brazzaville, as French troops prepared to leave after evacuating some 5 500 foreigners, including a number of South Africans. Although a ceasefire had been brokered on Wednesday by the French, fighting broke out again on the weekend in the region around the airport. Some three thousand people, mainly civilians, are believed to have died in ten days of fighting.
French soldiers stationed at the airport said they could see heavy weapons being moved into position around the airport as the two sides, the army and a private militia belonging to a former Congo dictator, manoevred to seize the city’s most strategic asset.
But peace talks were held on Saturday despite the fighting, and Gabonese President Omar Bongo sent his private jet to Brazzaville to fetch representatives of both sides to attend talks in his capital, Libreville.