Rebel positions destroyed, army claims

Senegal’s army has launched a “mopping-up operation” near Ziguinchor, the main southern town in the Casamance area, following recent rebel attacks on government forces there, the Armed Forces Ministry in Dakar said on Monday in a press statement. It said the operation allowed government forces to locate and destroy firing positions considered a threat to the local population, intercept columns of armed rebels and secure tourist routes leading to Cap Skirring, some 60 km southwest of Ziguinchor. The statement gave no indication of casualties on either side. Casamance’s separatist movement, the Mouvement des forces democratiques de Casamance (MFDC), took up arms in 1982 to fight for independence for the area.