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French force faces first full-on firefight

French troops make a reconnaissance south of Bunia in the Democratic Republic of Congo as Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC) militia leave frontline fighting. The troops, sent to stop tribal fighting in the town, opened fire for the first time and made a show of force after encountering gunfire on Saturday, witnesses said. PHOTO: REUTERS

French troops leading an emergency force in Congo came under fire for the first time in their mission to stabilize this northeastern town ravaged by tribal turf wars.

The firefight Saturday on the outskirts of Bunia, from which the French special forces emerged unscathed, occurred amid growing concern that the force's mandate is too limited and does not include the demilitarization of the town that six weeks ago boasted a university, a brand-new mobile phone network and a thriving trade in gold.

"I don't know why they are here," said Jan Mol, a Dutch priest who has lived in Bunia for 15 years. "It's just show."

The French patrol -- among the first 400 members of a force expected to number 1,400 -- returned small arms, heavy machine gun and light tank fire after being fired at by attackers about six kilometers south of Bunia, spokesman Major Xavier Pons said.

Pons said it was impossible to know who provoked the 20-minute gun battle and whether the 70 French troops and 20 vehicles were the target or had been caught in the cross fire between the Lendu and Hema tribal militia.

The Hema Union of Congolese Patriots, or UPC, which currently controls the town, blamed the Lendu for the attack on the French patrol. The Lendu could not be reached for comment.

Later, French troops scoured the hilly area from where the fire had come but found nothing -- "no corpses, nothing," Pons said.

The Hema and Lendu militias began intense fighting for control of Bunia, the capital of unstable Ituri province, in early May after some 6,000 troops from neighboring Uganda pulled out in accordance with an agreement to end a five-year civil war in Africa's third-largest nation.

More than 400 people were killed in a week of fighting between the factions, which were armed with bows and arrows, machetes, assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades.

Corpses lay abandoned on the streets for days as a handful of UN aid workers and thousands of Congolese seeking refuge huddled in UN compounds in the town center and at the airport.

About 700 UN troops, who could only fire in self-defense, guarded their compounds and looked on.

The high number of civilian deaths led the UN Security Council to authorize the deployment in Bunia of the international force, which began arriving on June 6.

The force, which is authorized to shoot to kill if necessary, has a three-month mission to secure the town and its airport and provide security for displaced people and aid agencies. But the troops won't be deployed outside Bunia where fighting continues and they don't have a mandate to disarm fighters.

Congolese and analysts say that troubles will continue unless the thousands of tribal fighters -- some as young as 10 -- can be disarmed.

The International Crisis Group, a respected Brussels, Belgium-based think tank, on Friday called for a much larger intervention force operating over a much larger area for a longer period of time.

Calling the present emergency force "a stopgap," ICG Africa director Francois Grignon said if Bunia were not urgently demilitarized, the French-led force "is likely to be caught in competing accusations from all the militias that almost certainly will lead to conflict."

The province of Ituri, which is about twice the size of Belgium, is a vast, fertile, mineral-rich region of forests, lush, green hills and rivers running with grains of gold.

But it's also the scene of some of the worst atrocities committed during the civil war in Congo ranging from massacres in churches and hospitals to cannibalism and rape.

Tribal disputes over power, land and other resources date back to the 19th century, but the outbreak of civil war in August 1998 brought a deadly new dimension to their differences as Rwanda, Uganda and the Congolese government armed and supported rival factions. An estimated 50,000 civilians have been killed in Ituri since 1999.
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