Report: Cease-fire reached in Chad
(CNN) — Rebels who entered the Chadian capital of N’Djamena and engaged in fighting there agreed to a cease-fire Saturday, according to an official Libyan news agency.
In a telephone conversation between Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and Mohammed Nouri, a rebel leader in Chad, Nouri agreed to a cease-fire and to talks aimed at implementing a peace and reconciliation agreement, JANA reported.
But rebel spokesman Mahamat Hassane Boulmaye said he had not heard of any cease-fire and did not believe Nouri would agree to an unconditional end to hostilities, The Associated Press reported.
The fighters would rebel, AP quoted him as saying in an early morning telephone call Sunday. He added that he was speaking from the border with Sudan and had not spoken to Nouri since Saturday afternoon, according to the AP.
Earlier, Chad’s ambassador to the United States insisted that government troops were fighting back rebels amid reports that at least 400 were in the city and had broken into the presidential palace.
Heavy fighting was reported around the presidential palace, the defense ministry and the official radio station building, as rebels streamed into the capital from several directions, a high-ranking German diplomatic source and security sources told CNN.
Security sources in N’Djamena said at least 400 rebels troops were in the city. Watch a report on rebel movements
The sources added that they had received varying reports about the whereabouts of Chad’s President Idriss Deby — some indicating he was holed up in the presidential palace under heavy guard, and other reports claiming he has fled to nearby Gabon.
David Martinon, a French presidential spokesman, said French President Nicolas Sarkozy held a long telephone conversation with Deby on Saturday and held an emergency meeting to discuss the unfolding situation in Chad.
Cabinet members involved in talks included Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner and Defense Minister Hervi Morin, the spokesman said.
The French Defense Ministry said Friday it was dispatching 140 soldiers from Gabon to N’Djamena to protect French citizens from the fighting.
Rebels faced little resistance entering the capital, a worker at the Kempinski Hotel in N’Djamena told CNN by phone.
This morning, I was in my room, and I saw many rebel groups entering the city in Japanese cars, said the staff member, who gave his name as Tigalta. They were not fighting. They entered the town freely. They found the population welcoming them — the people of the town.
Chadian Ambassador to the U.S. Mahamoud Adam Bechir told CNN, however, that rebel forces were fleeing the city and that the government was in control of the situation.
Characterizing the rebels as mercenaries, Bechir claimed they were abandoning their vehicles and their military uniforms in an attempt to avoid capture.
Bechir accused the government in neighboring Sudan of supporting the rebels’ actions. He claimed the whole objective of the regime in Khartoum was to destabilize Chad’s government. Watch why Sudan is being blamed
The French government said it opposed the rebels’ actions. You cannot try to use force to change a sovereign government, said Nicolas Princen, a spokesman for Sarkozy’s office.
The U.S. State Department said it joined the African Union in condemning the attempt by armed rebels entering from outside the country to seize power extra-constitutionally in Chad.
We call for calm in the capital and support the AU’s call for an immediate end to armed attacks and to refrain from violence that might harm innocent civilians, the State Department said.
Meanwhile, a bomb hit the residence of the Saudi ambassador, killing an employee’s wife and daughter, an official at the embassy told the Saudi Press Agency.
Annette Rehrl, an official from the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees in eastern Chad, said the agency had received mixed messages about the situation in the capital. The agency was evacuating all nonessential staff from N’Djamena, but around 200 UNHCR staff in the east were staying put for the time being, Rehrl said.
Armed attacks in the eastern town of Guereda on Thursday forced the evacuation of around 30 UNHCR staff.
A spokesman for the U.N. peacekeeping mission said most of its 300 hundred staff had already been moved to Cameroon, while a small contingent remained at a hotel in N’Djamena under the protection of French forces.
The European Union agreed this week to the deployment of 3,700 peacekeepers to eastern Chad with a U.N. mandate to protect the 420,000 refugees and aid operations.
France was preparing to evacuate an estimated 1,300 French nationals from the capital, and the French army was preparing to fly a plane from Paris to Chad. About 700 French and other Westerners had gathered at three locations in N’Djamena in preparation for a possible evacuation, France’s foreign ministry said Saturday, adding that an emergency telephone number had been set up.
In addition, French troops were in control of the N’Djamena airport, making evacuations more feasible, U.S. military officials told CNN.
The U.S. Embassy on Saturday ordered the evacuation of employees’ families and nonemergency staff from N’Djamena and urged U.S. citizens to remain in safe locations indoors, amid reports of looting in the capital. The embassy asked U.S. citizens who wished to evacuate to contact it.
The U.S. Embassy also issued a travel warning urging citizens to defer all travel to Chad. The embassy said the recent case involving a French charity accused of kidnapping Chadian children has heightened government scrutiny of humanitarian and other organizations.
Chad’s president, who himself seized power in a rebel uprising in 1990, has been contending with a growing conflict centered in eastern Chad. In addition, the rebellion in the east is closely linked with the civil war in neighboring Sudan’s Darfur region.
Around 240,000 people have crossed the border to Chad to flee the fighting in Darfur, where Sudan’s government and government-supported Arab militias have been accused of widespread atrocities against the civilian population.
Both the Sudanese and Chadian governments have accused each other of fomenting the violence in their countries by giving support to the rebel groups.
In May 2006, rebels got within a mile of N’Djamena before government forces halted them, reportedly with the help of French troops garrisoned there; Deby denied such aid. His government later gave a top ministerial post to a leader of the rebels.
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