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Former rebel becomes President of Burundi

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Friday, August 19, 2005

Pierre Nkurunziza, leader of the former rebel group CNDD-FDD, has been elected unopposed as President of Burundi by the country's Senate and National Assembly. The CNDD-FDD had won landslide victories in communal and national elections earlier this year, the first since the 1993 assassination of President Melchior Ndadaye plunged Burundi into more than a decade of ethnically-charged civil war. Nkurunziza replaces Domitien Ndayizeye, who had served as head of a transitional government since 2003.

One key challenge will be to resolve ongoing tension between the country's Hutu and Tutsi ethnic groups. More than 300,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed since 1993. Burundi's Tutsi-dominated army is believed to have killed thousands of Hutu civilians during the ten-year civil war, while Nkurunziza's own group, CNDD-FDD, has been accused of deliberately killing Tutsis. The extremist group Palipehutu-FNL continues to stage attacks, with this week seeing the first anniversary of the Gatumba massacre, in which more than 150 Congolese Tutsi refugees were killed.

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This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.
Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.

The text of this article has been released into the public domain. In the event that this is not legally possible, this article may be used for any purpose, without any condition, unless such conditions are required by law. This applies worldwide. Copyright terms on images, however, may vary, so please check individual image pages prior to duplication.
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