By Jonathan Luxmoore
A senior Catholic priest in the Central African Republic has warned of growing clashes between Christians and Muslims, and urged the international community to act “within weeks” to prevent the country’s breakup.
“The Christian population has set up self-defense groups to stop the pillaging and violence, and since some Muslims have been killed, this has brought deadly reprisals against Christians in turn,” said Msgr. Cyriaque Gbate Doumalo, secretary-general of the county’s bishops’ conference.
“We deplore the international community’s inertia. People are in total despair, and we’ll witness our country’s permanent partition if it doesn’t intervene immediately,” he said.
His comments came as fighting continued in the eastern town of Bossangoa between forces of the ruling Seleka alliance and groups loyal to the country’s ousted president.
In a Sept. 13 interview with Catholic News Service from the capital, Bangui, he said all transport and communication links with Bossangoa had been cut, including contacts with Bishop Nestor-Desire Nongo-Aziagbia.
However, he added, refugee accounts suggested most Christians had fled the town to surrounding villages to escape attacks by the mostly Muslim Seleka.
“There’s no security and the situation is chaotic and catastrophic,” Msgr. Doumalo said.
“There are real risks of serious inter-confessional conflict between Christians and Muslims. Although we don’t have exact figures, we know Christians have been killed, burnt and maimed, with many left injured without treatment,” he explained.
Seleka, composed partly of Arab-speaking Islamists, launched an offensive in December, accusing President Francois Bozize of reneging on power-sharing promises, and suspended the constitution after seizing Bangui March 24.
In a June statement, the bishops’ conference said Seleka’s occupation had left the country “looted and destroyed” and its “social fabric completely torn up.” They said that alliance groups had established a “parallel administration” in some regions and destroyed local archives to “annihilate the national memory.”
Father Aurelio Gazzera, an Italian Carmelite missionary, told Fides, the news agency of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, the fighting in Bossangoa had pitted Seleka elements against fighters loyal to ex-president Bozize, as well as rebels from the Popular Army for the Restoration of Democracy, which had reformed and rearmed since Bozize’s ouster.
The missionary said Sept. 9 that he believed “someone who for now remains in the shadows” was using local groups “to provoke a sectarian conflict” in the area, where Bozize loyalists killed five Seleka soldiers and several civilians in a Sept. 5 attack on four local villages.
Meanwhile, the aid organization, Doctors without Borders, confirmed Sept. 12 at least 100 had been killed in clashes Sept. 7-8 and said it was concerned about an inter-religious conflict.
Msgr. Doumalo told CNS religious leaders had tried for months to calm Christian-Muslim tensions but could do little in isolated areas like Bossangoa.
He said Seleka groups had profaned churches, and ransacked and burned presbyteries and religious houses in the Bouar Diocese in mid-August, killing at least 30 and destroying more than 2,000 homes.
“Christians have tried to defend themselves, so Seleka is now taking revenge by attacking villages and killing Christians,” Msgr. Doumalo said.
“As a church, we’ve demanded that the different parties meet around the table at a national conference to seek a consensus and find a solution. But the government itself is doing nothing to stop these ignoble attacks.”
The president of the bishops’ conference, Archbishop Dieudonne Nzapalainga of Bangui, visited the scene of clashes in the Bouar Diocese Sept. 4-5 with Caritas Internationalis representatives. – CNS