Burundi army: 87 people killed in Friday violence

Army spokesman Col. Gaspard Baratuza said eight security officers were among those killed and 21 others wounded in the fighting.

“They entered in our compounds, gathered all young and middle aged men, took them and killed them away from their homes”, said one resident in Nyakabiga.

A senior police official in Bujumbura’s Nyakabiga district told Reuters there were 20 young men killed in the neighborhood, and a witness reportedly saw at least 16 bullet-ridden bodies in the same area.

Violence from coordinated attacks on three Burundian army installations killed 87 people, an army spokesman said Saturday, showing the escalating turmoil over the disputed third term of President Pierre Nkurunziza.

The strikes on military bases on Friday were the boldest attacks since the failed coup attempt, and some analysts in Burundi said that the bodies found on Saturday morning appeared to represent a retaliatory message.

But some residents said they suspected the authorities of trying to hide evidence of a massacre perpetrated by the security forces, a view echoed by a European diplomat.

Eight of those who died were security officers and 49 people were captured, Col Gaspard Baratuza said.

More than 100 people have been killed in two days of violence across Burundi’s capital – the deadliest period for the city since an attempted coup in May.

In the Nyakabiga neighborhood, residents said they woke up to the shock of bodies sprawled in the streets. The hands of some of the dead were tied behind them, said the witness, who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of concern for his safety. Witnesses said the security forces killed unarmed men. “If I had money, I would go buy a passport and flee”, Fidele Muyobera, 22, told AP.

The United Nations said violence since then has killed more than 240 people and prompted more than 200,000 Burundians to flee the country.

Protests were sparked in April this year after Nkurunziza announced he would run again for the presidency and a constitutional court ruled in his favour, though reports suggested judges had been intimidated. Several hundred people have also been imprisoned for opposing Nkurunziza’s re-election in July this year.

Samantha Power, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, said “high-level political dialogue” needs to happen between the government and the opposition party in order to diffuse the situation and avoid a mass conflict.

Businessman Gerald Bigirimana said: “What is the global community waiting for?”

State department spokesman John Kirby said the USA was deeply concerned about the violence and called for neighbouring countries to put pressure on the East African landlocked state to start negotiations with opposition groups.