DAKAR (Reuters) – A United Nations peacekeeper from Rwanda was killed on Monday in an attack on their patrol in northeast Central African Republic (CAR), the U.N. said.
The attack took place 3 km (1.86 miles) from the town of Sam-Ouandja. Three of the assailants were killed and one captured during the attack, it said in a statement.
U.N. peacekeepers were deployed to CAR in 2014 to help curb violence that broke out a year earlier when mainly Muslim Seleka rebels ousted then president Francois Bozize, prompting reprisals from mostly Christian militias.
No militia was directly blamed for the latest attack, which the peacekeeping mission MINUSCA said was carried out by armed elements.
“Despicable attack on a (U.N.) patrol aimed at protecting civilians & humanitarians in #CAR led to the death of a peacekeeper,” the U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix said on Twitter.
Violence waned in CAR after a shaky peace accord was signed in February 2019 between the government and 14 armed groups, but the situation remains volatile as swathes of territory are still outside government control in one of the world’s poorest countries.
(Reporting by Alessandra Prentice; Editing by Sandra Maler)
