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FDD warns against "ethnicising" army

    NAIROBI

    The rebel Forces pour la defense de la democratie (FDD) have denied accepting a formula of 50-50 between Hutus and Tutsis in a future Burundi army. In a statement, received by IRIN on Monday, the FDD warned against "ethnicising" the army. "Aren't 38 years of an ethnicised army enough?", the statement said. "Furthermore, these ethnic proportions do not resolve the underlying problems of regionalism." "That's why we believe that the future national army should be based on forces from the people in arms ... in this case, the FDD to which should be joined members of the Burundi army who are not guilty of the cyclical genocide that has engulfed Burundi since independence in 1962," the statement said.

    This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions

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