The death toll is expected to rise as UN forces sift through the remains of a refugee camp which witnesses say was completely razed.

The attacks, said to be the work of Islamic militants, targeted the Catholic mission refugee centre and the town's cathedral and Bishop's residence.

Bishop Blaise Mada, vicar general of the diocese of Alindao, and the Rev. Celestine Ngoumbango, the parish priest of the village of Mingala, are among the dead.

According to witnesses, Mada was gunned down during an assault on the bishop's residence where he had taken refuge with others attempting to escape the gunmen.

Father Mathieu Bondobo, the Vicar General of the Archdiocese of Bangui, says at the camp the attackers "started burning tents, killing, looting people's property."

It was there the charred remains of Ngoumbango were discovered.

Threats before the attack received by the Bishop of Alindao, Cyr-Nestor Yapaupa, suggest the attacks may have been premeditated.

Bondobo says although Yapaupa notified UN peacekeepers of the threats, they did not defend the facilities or intervene.

"Everyone was left to their own devices [when the rebels attacked] and the rebels had time to do whatever they wanted. And they did," Bondobo says.

The refugee centre, which has a capacity of 25,000, welcomes displaced people of all religions.

It was established to foster civil harmony.

The attack prompted the UN peacekeeping mission to send additional forces to the area to prevent further fighting between armed elements affiliated with the Christian anti-Balakas and the mainly-Muslim UPC Selekas.

Source

• Independent
• Chanel News Asia
• Vatican News
• Image: dw.com

Cox says sectarian violence in the Republic urgently calls for "showing mercy" and to "being ready to forgive, to help people to overcome terrible things such as death of a loved one or the destruction of their village." Read more

The nation has been embroiled in a civil war between a Muslim minority and a Christian majority since March, 2013.

Arriving in the capital, Bangui, Francis declared himself a "pilgrim of peace and an apostle of hope".

The Pope was greeted upon his arrival with heavy security presence.

United Nations soldiers carrying rifles were alongside plainclothes officers, and what appeared to be members of the Vatican detail wearing heavy protective vests.

UN tanks and pickup trucks also lined the streets near crowds waiting for the Pope, with mounted heavy guns manned by soldiers.

Helicopters flew overhead.

The Pope visited Koudoukou mosque in Bangui on Monday and met local Muslim leaders in an area of the city regarded as dangerous.

Residents of that area, known as PK5, were unable to leave it on Sunday because of armed Christian militia fighters surroundings its perimeter.

Speaking to a crowd at the mosque, Francis said Muslims and Christians are brothers, and must live as such.

At the CAR presidential palace on Sunday, Francis called for unity and to avoid "the temptation of fear of others, of the unfamiliar, of what is not part of our ethnic group, our political views or our religious confession".

Francis said he hoped elections scheduled for the CAR would herald a new chapter in its history.

On Sunday, he next went to the Saint Saveur refugee camp, home to 3700 people, which is known for high rates of malaria and for its appalling hygiene conditions.

Residents sang and danced for the Pontiff and expressed hopes that he would act as a mediator to quell the conflict.

"I wish for you and all Central Africans a great peace . . . whatever may be your ethnicity, your religion, your social status," Francis told the crowd.

The Pope then led them in a chant of "We are all brothers".

The visit to the CAR is the final leg of a three nation African journey for the Pope.

Sources

• The Guardian
• BBC
• BBC
• Catholic Herald
• National Catholic Reporter
• Image: Reuters

The attack on the church of Our Lady of Fatima in the capital Bangui on May 28 was blamed on the Seleka militia group.

Those in the church were sheltering from violent clashes between the mostly Muslim Seleka and the nominally Christian "anti-balaka" militia.

The Archbishop of Bangui, Dieudonné Nzapalainga, said the attackers were foreign jihadists who spoke neither French nor the local Sango.

The Vatican missionary news agency Fides named the priest who died as 76-year old Fr Paul-Emile Nzale.

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"The state no longer exists," said Archbishop Samuel Kleda from Cameroon.

"The only institution that is functioning [in the CAR] is the Catholic Church," he said.

"Actually, the displaced are living in Catholic parishes," Archbishop Kleda told Fides News Agency.

He said this just before the United Nations approved the creation of a UN peacekeeping force for the strife-ridden nation.

The force will have up to 10,000 troops, 1800 police and 20 corrections officers.

The UN operation will take over in September from an African Union force, which was deployed in December.

During a recent visit to CAR Bangui, UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, said French and African soldiers serving in the country were being overwhelmed by a state of anarchy

The mainly Muslim Seleka seized power a year ago, perpetrating abuses on the majority Christian population that triggered revenge attacks by anti-Balaka fighters.

This led to thousands of deaths and the displacing of hundreds of thousands of people.

Senior UN officials have warned that the violence in the large, sparsely populated country is in danger of spiralling into genocide.

One quarter of the CAR's 4.6 million population is said to be Roman Catholic, and the majority are Christian.

Archbishop Kleda visited the CAR capital Bangui to show solidarity with the local people.

He said the violence in the CAR is not a sectarian, religious war, but a "war of predation" between rebels and militia.

Some believe the root cause of the violence is not religious, but economic.

The CAR is near the bottom of the United Nation's Human Development Index.

There are only 20 registered businesses in the country and little normal schooling.

Religious leaders believe many of the young men recruited to join the Seleka did so because they were previously promised jobs in the army.

The jobs never materialised.

And many of the young men involved in the anti-balaka are motivated because they don't have work.

Sources

• Christian Post
• The Guardian
• Time
• Reuters
• Image: Japan Times

They have pleaded for the deployment of United Nations peacekeepers.

Continue reading

Fr Xavier-Arnauld Fagba opened his church doors to protect the Muslims from attacks by a militia, the Globe and Mail reports.

"They didn't have anyone to help them," said Fr Fagba, 31, who was ordained just four months ago.

"When the Muslims were attacked, the people didn't help them," he said.

"That's when I decided to look for them and bring them here. I did it in the name of my faith. My faith asks me to transcend the most difficult obstacles."

The Muslims at the church are members of the Peul minority, a community of traditional herders.

Accused of supporting atrocities by Muslim-led rebels who seized power in Central African Republic last year, they are often targeted for revenge attacks by the largely Christian anti-balaka militia.

But the people at the church say they never supported the rebels.

On January 16, after the rebels were pushed from power, anti-balaka fighters attacked the mosques in the town of Boali, about 100 kilometres north of the capital, Bangui.

One shepherd was outside a mosque, preparing to pray, when the militia attacked with guns and knives, killing seven people in front of him.

He rushed home and hid his wife and children.

Then the priest arrived, asking them to run to the church.

Fr Fagba rescued hundreds of Muslims that day, going house to house and even into the bush to find them.

On February 4, the militia attacked the church with machine gun fire, but no-one was hurt.

Dozens of African Union peacekeeping troops are posted around the church to protect the Muslims.

But venturing outside the church for food and goods is very dangerous for them.

On Sunday mornings, the Muslims get up early to clean the church and sweep the floors, so that it will be tidy when the Catholics arrive for Mass.

According to reports from Voice of American and Human Rights Watch, other priests in the Central African Republic are also making their church compounds available to shelter Muslims.

Sources

• The Globe and Mail
• The Irish Catholic
• Image: The Globe and Mail

The humanitarian emergency in the Central African Republic (CAR), a landmass bigger than France where the average male life expectancy is 48, remains a blind spot for most of the international community.

Samantha Power, the US ambassador to the UN, noted recently that the situation in the CAR has been referred to as "the worst crisis most people have never heard of".

One man describes how his four-year-old son's throat was slit, and how he saw a snake swallowing a baby.

A woman explains that she is caring for a young girl because her mother went searching for medicine and was bludgeoned to death with Kalashnikov rifles.

A young man tells how he was bound and thrown to the crocodiles, but managed to swim to safety.

This is the world of horrors that the Central African Republic (CAR) has become. Thousands of people are dying at the hands of soldiers and militia gangs or from untreated diseases such as malaria.

Boys and girls as young as eight are pressganged into fighting between Christians and Muslims. There are reports of beheadings and public execution-style killings. Villages are razed to the ground.

Never much more than a phantom state, the CAR has sucked in thousands of mercenaries from neighbouring countries and, France warned on Thursday, now stands "on the verge of genocide".

Yet many would struggle to find the country on a map, despite the clue in its afterthought name. Continue reading.

Source: The Guardian

Image: Fleeing families arrive at a camp near the cathedral in Bossangoa this month Matthieu Alexandre/AFP/Getty Images

One of the world's poorest countries, the landlocked Central African Republic has an extremely low level of human development.

The population of 5.2 million is 50 per cent and about half the Christians are Catholic.

Though Muslims make up no more than 15 per cent of the population, the Islamist rebel movement Seleka seized control in March, suspending the constitution and dissolving the parliament.

The Seleka have also plundered the country, looting from families, religious orders and the Church.

The African Catholic bishops' conference expressed "shock and outrage" at the "serious human rights violations" in the country, as well as the "quasi indifference of the international community".

The bishops called on international bodies, including the African Union, the European Union and the United Nations, to "help end all foreign interference in the country" and to "guarantee emergency humanitarian assistance".

The bishops themselves have mobilised the Catholic aid agency Caritas to contribute to an appeal for the country, and said they "urge … sister Churches of the world to intensify their solidarity with Caritas and the Church of the Central African Republic in their efforts to help the many victims".

The international medical agency Doctors Without Borders said that the country's health care system had collapsed, with most aid agencies having withdrawn to the capital city, leaving the rest of the country helpless.

Earlier, a statement from Archbishop Dieudonné Nzapalainga of Bangui and nine humanitarian organisations said about a million children are not going to school, thousands of children have been forced into the ranks of armed groups, the population is deprived of the most basic services, and "children and especially girls are exposed to a large number of abuses, including sexual violence and early marriage".

The Central African Republic is surrounded by six of Africa's most fragile nations: Chad, Sudan, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo and Cameroon.

Sources:

Catholic News Agency

Vatican News

Catholic News Service

Image: Caritas