Police officers asked to report to stations countrywide

In efforts to restore security in the Central African Republic, Public Security Minister Col Paulin Bondeboli has directed police officers to report to their duty stations across the country immediately. "I have given instructions that they join their stations in provinces in a week or two," Bondeboli said on Monday at a news conference in the capital, Bangui. He said the presence of the police, gendarmerie, military and administrative authorities would reassure the population. "We want to restore security nationwide before the end of the year," he added. No military, police or administrative officials have reported in the north of the country since October 2002, when fighting broke out between government troops and rebel fighters loyal to current leader Francois Bozize. The fighting resulted in the destruction of private and public buildings, including police stations. The fighting ended when Bozize ousted President Ange-Felix Patasse on 15 March. Bondeboli said many police stations in Bangui lacked vehicles and were housed in private buildings or by local district administrations. He said non-armed self-defence groups comprising voluntary youths had been set up in the seventh district of Bangui to help the police and the gendarmerie. If the project succeeded, he said, it would be replicated in all eight districts of the city. The ministry had recruited 200 more policemen, he said, who were currently being trained, to reinforce the capacity of the police. He said the government wanted to organise elections in 2004 under satisfactory security conditions. Bozize has announced a constitutional referendum in mid-2004, the presidential election in the third quarter of 2004 and parliamentary elections in the fourth quarter of the same year.