Chad army attacks rebels

N’DJAMENA – Chad’s army attacked an anti-government rebel group for a second day yesterday, trying to dislodge the insurgents from their mountain hideout near the eastern border with Sudan’s Darfur region, army sources said.

The latest clashes occurred after government troops moved on Monday against fighters of the rebel Assembly of Forces for Change (RFC) sheltering in the rugged Kapka mountain range northeast of the town of Biltine. President Idriss Deby’s forces have been engaging at least three rebel factions in the heaviest fighting in months in eastern Chad following the collapse of an October 25 peace accord.The renewed conflict comes just weeks before a European Union peacekeeping force of up to 3 700 troops is due to deploy in eastern Chad on a United Nations mission to protect civilian refugees and foreign aid workers.Chadian army sources, who asked not to be named, said government forces moved against the RFC from several directions.”The rebels were encircled in a ‘wadi’ (dried-out riverbed) near the Kapka massif …They were embedded in caves.Fighting was heavy,” one of the sources told Reuters.There was no immediate word on casualties and no independent confirmation of the clashes was available.Nampa-ReutersPresident Idriss Deby’s forces have been engaging at least three rebel factions in the heaviest fighting in months in eastern Chad following the collapse of an October 25 peace accord.The renewed conflict comes just weeks before a European Union peacekeeping force of up to 3 700 troops is due to deploy in eastern Chad on a United Nations mission to protect civilian refugees and foreign aid workers.Chadian army sources, who asked not to be named, said government forces moved against the RFC from several directions.”The rebels were encircled in a ‘wadi’ (dried-out riverbed) near the Kapka massif …They were embedded in caves.Fighting was heavy,” one of the sources told Reuters.There was no immediate word on casualties and no independent confirmation of the clashes was available.Nampa-Reuters

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