Fighting displaces 30,000 in the west

Fighting in the hills around Burundi's capital, Bujumbura, in recent weeks has displaced some 30,000 people, a representative of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) told IRIN on Wednesday.

New agencies reported on Thursday that an estimated 26-30 people had been killed in the recent ground and air searches carried out by the Tutsi-dominated army to flush out Hutu rebels who had settled in the mountainous Bujumbura Rural Province.

Reuters news agency quoted the army spokesman, Colonel Augustin Nzabampema, as saying that the searches were part of a "mopping-up operation" in the area around Bujumbura following fighting in the rebel stronghold of Tenga at the end of 2001. The government reported at least 500 Hutu rebels were killed during the month-long campaign around Tenga, some six kilometres north of the capital. Nzabampema said rebels had then scattered across Bujumbura Rural, AFP reported, and the army was now trying to flush them out.

An representative from OCHA in Bujumbura told IRIN that local authorities had reported the presence of 5,929 displaced families in the area around Bujumbura.

"People tend to run to where they have coping mechanisms," she said.