BANGUI: In a positive development, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced on Tuesday that 19 troops who were taken by rebels in the northern Central African Republic (CAR) in February have been released.
The troops had been seized by a group called the Coalition of Patriots for Change (CPC) after clashes at the village of Sikikede that the government had said inflicted “considerable losses” on its forces.
Out of 20 troops seized in the raid in the Vakaga region on February 14, 19 have been released and will arrive shortly in the town of Birao.
They will remain there until their return to Bangui can be organized. According to Yves Van Loo, the deputy mission chief of ICRC, the soldiers “seem to be in good health and able to make the journey.”
The 20th soldier had been wounded and was receiving medical care and will be picked up at a different location later.
The CPC is an alliance of militias created in 2020 in a bid to overthrow former president Francois Bozize’s successor, Faustin Archange Touadera.
The CAR remains scarred by a 2013 civil war unleashed by a coup against then-president Bozize, in which armed groups battled along sectarian lines.
Central African Republic is world’s poorest and most troubled country
The landlocked CAR is one of the poorest and most troubled countries in the world, despite an abundance of mineral wealth.
In a statement, the CPC said it had taken a “voluntary and unilateral decision to release the 20 soldiers who had been taken prisoner.”
Armed forces spokesman Augustin Ndando Kpako said the release of the 20 “had been our greatest priority… we wanted to see them free.”
The CPC advanced on Bangui in December 2020 as presidential elections loomed. They were thwarted with the help of Russian paramilitaries, who were rushed in to shore up the country’s fragile military after an appeal by Touadera.
Their presence became the trigger for a chill in relations between CAR and France, the country’s former colonial power and traditional ally.
France, the United Nations, and others say they are mercenaries from the Wagner group, who have been linked with atrocities and looting of resources.
Facing a mounting anti-French campaign allegedly steered by Russia, France suspended military cooperation and, last December, pulled its last troops from the country.
The release of the troops seized by the CPC is a welcome development, and it is hoped that it will lead to further progress toward peace and stability in the CAR.
