It was a bloody day in Central African Republic when 19 people, including one UN peacekeeper, were killed in a clash with militias on Wednesday.
The clash in one of the world’s poorest and most unstable countries also led to the wounding of 100 persons.
The clashes between peacekeepers and militias took place in a flashpoint Muslim enclave of the capital Bangui.
Bangui’s bloodiest flare-up in two years brought hundreds of angry residents of the PK5 district to the base of the United Nations mission, MINUSCA.
There, they laid out the corpses of 17 men who they said had been killed by UN troops on Tuesday — violence that according to MINUSCA had begun with an ambush of peacekeepers after they had launched a security sweep.
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Several bodies bore bullet wounds, reporters say.
“Yesterday they killed lots of people. Here are the dead, which we have brought here,” one man said.
Several UN armoured vehicles were stationed around the MINUSCA base.
A security source late Tuesday said a UN soldier was killed and eight were wounded in the violence, which came when their patrol was ambushed on the outskirts of the neighbourhood.
