Amnesty International says it has uncovered new evidence of the slaughter of women, children and the elderly among the Muslim minority in the Central African Republic.
More than 50 Muslims were killed in two reported attacks in villages northwest of the capital Bangui.
The victims in Boyali and Bossembele included five women, three old men and at least six children – one just 18 months old.
According to Amnesty, this travesty underscores the extreme dangers faced by the Muslim minority in the Central African Republic, and the group calls for a more robust peacekeeping effort to protect civilians outside of the capital.
“International peacekeeping forces are failing the Muslim community,” said Joanne Mariner, Amnesty’s senior crisis advisor in Bangui. “Scores of people were left unprotected from vicious ‘anti-balaka’ reprisals at a time when such attacks were entirely predictable.”
Both attacks were carried out by Christian anti-balaka (meaning ‘anti-machete’ or ‘anti-sword’) militias that now hold many towns and villages northwest of the capital, from which Muslims have fled for their lives, their homes since looted and burned.
In the attack in Boyali on 14 January, the only survivors of the machete-wielding gangs were a 12-year-old boy who managed to slip away during the melee, and a seven-month-old girl who was left with a Christian woman.
The second attack occurred two days later Bossembele, 30km north of Boyali, where Muslims left behind in an attempted mass flight engaged in a firefight with anti-balaka forces that lasted for many hours.
Eventually the anti-balaka militia stormed the central mosque, where many residents were taking refuge. Some 25 bodies were later found inside the mosque, and another 18 were found strewn around the building and nearby streets.
According to the national Red Cross, most of the victims were killed with machetes and knives.
Amnesty, meanwhile, says the slaughter in Boyali and Bossembeli is part of a larger pattern across the CAR.
Delegates for the human rights group on a visit to the capital region witnessed massive and uncontrolled looting, destruction of mosques, and burning of civilian property. They were stopped at numerous checkpoints manned by anti-balaka who demanded money.
Also seen were hundreds of anti-balaka militia members openly carrying machetes, hunting rifles, homemade firearms and, in some cases, assault rifles.
The unrest appears to be fuelled by anger among some Christians at the Muslim minority, who are believed to have been complicit in abuses perpetrated by the militant coalition Séléka. These include the killing of some 1,000 Christians by ex-Séléka forces in Bangui in December.
“The Christian community has suffered enormously over the past year,” says Mariner. “The desire for revenge is palpable in the CAR. Given how predictable such killings are, more robust peacekeeping steps should be taken to prevent them.”
