FBIS4-23846
"drafr117_b_94002"
FBIS-AFR-94-117
Daily Report
16 Jun 1994
EAST AFRICA
Tanzania
Camp Ban on Suspected Mass Killers Sparks Riot
Camp Ban on Suspected Mass Killers Sparks Riot
AB1606195794 Paris AFP in English 1659 GMT 16 Jun 94
AB1606195794
Paris AFP
English
BFN
[Text] Nairobi, June 16 (AFP) -- Rwandan refugees rioted in
a camp in Tanzania and threatened to kill foreign relief workers
in anger at a ban on suspected mass killers entering the camp,
aid officials said Thursday [16 June].
About 50 foreign aid workers left the camp after angry
refugees hurled stones and shouted threats at them on Wednesday,
a spokesman for the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR) said.
The rioters dispersed after Tanzanian police went into the
Benaco Camp near the northern border with Rwanda and fired in
the air, the spokesman, Panos Moumtzis, said in Nairobi.
The trouble started when a well-known Hutu suspected of
committing atrocities during Rwanda's 10-week ethnic and
political bloodbath returned to the camp.
The man, who was not named, had been arrested by Tanzanian
police in April with about 15 other Rwandans suspected of
massacres when they crossed the border into Tanzania along with
hundreds of thousands of refugees.
They were freed a week ago on condition that they stayed out
of the refugee camp, but one man returned on what he said was a
visit to his wife and children.
A riot erupted when UNHCR representatives went to the camp
to
protest against his presence which they feared could spark
trouble, Moumtzis said.
"There were about three thousand people shouting, screaming
and throwing stones," he said. "They wanted him to stay at the
camp. They dispersed when Tanzanian policemen went in and
started shooting in the air."
Relief officials say many suspected mass murderers have
crossed into Tanzania, mingling with civilian refugees from
fighting. About 300,000 Rwandans including Hutus and minority
Tutsis are encamped at Benaco.
Up to half a million Rwandans, mostly Tutsis and Hutu
opposition supporters, have been butchered since the April 6
death of president Juvenal Habyarimana, a Hutu, rekindled the
civil war between mainly Tutsi rebels and the government, and
sparked massacres committed mainly by extremist Hutu militias.