Suspected separatists kill four in southern Senegal
Source: Reuters
DAKAR, Feb 15 (Reuters) - Suspected separatist guerrillas killed four people when they opened fire on a bus at a roadblock in southern Senegal, less than two weeks before a presidential election, security sources said on Thursday. President Abdoulaye Wade, who remains favourite to win re-election in the West African country's Feb. 25 ballot, had pledged at 2000 polls to end the two-decade-old uprising, but has so far not made any such pledge in this year's campaign. The incident occurred late on Wednesday, 30 km (19 miles) north of the provincial capital Ziguinchor. "The assailants opened fire at the public transport vehicle killing three passengers on the spot. A fourth person died later," one security source in Ziguinchor told Reuters. Government soldiers were sent to the area but the gunmen had vanished into the lush forests of Casamance, the source added. The region of winding mangrove creaks, rice fields and palm-oil groves has long been one of Senegal's main tourist attractions despite an insurrection by MFDC rebels, who took up arms in 1982 accusing the central government of neglecting the mainly-Christian province. Sandwiched between Gambia to the north and Guinea Bissau to the south, Casamance is isolated from the rest of Muslim Senegal, but produces the majority of the country's rice. Fighting peaked in the 1990s and has declined in recent years, partly due to Wade's peace efforts which culminated in a 2004 peace deal. Violence flared again in mid-2006 as a hardline group led by rebel commander Salif Sadio, who rejected the agreement, fought rival MFDC factions and the Senegalese and Guinea Bissau armies. Fighting in northern Casamance has forced several thousands of villagers to seek refuge across the border in Gambia. The historic leader of the revolt and a major proponent of the 2004 peace deal, Roman Catholic priest Father Augustin Diamacoune Senghor, died in Paris last month, aged 78.
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