French troops sent to stop tribal fighting in the Congolese town of Bunia opened fire for the first time and made a show of force after being attacked by a group of militiamen today, witnesses said.
Attackers hidden in long grass fired mortars and machineguns at a convoy of French troops rumbling along a road outside the southeastern fringes of town, where rival militias have killed hundreds.
There were no immediate reports of casualties. "The French are being attacked, nobody knows by whom," Maj Xavier Pons told reporters travelling with a convoy near Bunia, in the northeast of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
"We returned fire with machineguns and light grenades launched by guns," Maj Pons said after the attack, which took place in a patch of bush and thick undergrowth about three kilometres (two miles) from the town centre.
"We came under heavy fire from machineguns and mortars." Troops from the convoy, which included 15 all-terrain vehicles, an armoured vehicle and about 70 soldiers, returned fire.
Fighting between ethnic Hema and Lendu militias has caused chaos in and around Bunia since early May, with hundreds of people slaughtered and tens of thousands fleeing their homes.
About 400 French troops arrived in Bunia over the past week, the vanguard of a 1,400-strong international force with a UN mandate to shield civilians from fighting - using force if necessary. French Mirage fighter jets and ground-attack aircraft based in Gabon and Chad are providing air support.
AFP