AFRICA/GUINEA - Talks between the junta and the opposition resume; group of Guineans criticize report on September 28 events which seems to be trying to provoke ethnic and religious conflict

Conakry (Agenzia Fides) – Talks resume today, 30 November in Ouagadougou, capital of Burkina Faso, between the military junta of Guinea and the "Live Forces", the symbol beneath which several opposition groups fall. Acting as mediator is the President of Burkina Faso, Blaise Compaoré. "During the suspension of negotiations, I was struck by the silence of the head of the military junta, Moussa Dadis Camara, usually quite talkative. It seems to me that this silence was an indication that the junta has accepted fully the mediation and that it believes in the negotiation,” Fides was told by a source from the local church, who for security reasons has asked to remain anonymous.
The "Live Forces" continue to press for Dadis' removal from power, but otherwise they do not seem to have reached a common negotiating platform.
In recent days, members of the UN Commission of Inquiry into the massacre of 28 September in the stadium in Conakry, which caused at least 150 deaths, arrived in Guinea. Recently, Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a report on this crime that has, however, provoked a protest letter from a group of Guinean citizens, both Christians and Muslims. In the letter, sent to Fides, HRW is accused of having published its report before the UN investigation into the events of 28 September. "As your report already indicates the guilty, without respect for the presumption of innocence, we ask what is the interest of the international inquiry announced by the United Nations?".
The letter criticizes especially the ethnic and religious interpretation of the events of 28 September by Human Rights Watch, according to which the security force formed by Christians and animists from the Guinea forest attacked Fulani Muslims of the coast. "The protest on 28 September was a political demonstration that responded to a call made to all the living forces of Guinea, and was not a meeting of a particular ethnic or religious group as you claim," says the letter, in which there is mention of the names of Christians and others from the Guinea forest who protested against the junta and who were affected by the violence of the military.
"In conclusion, the reference to the ethnic and religious dimension in your report is a dangerous drift aimed at fanning the flames of the present state of Guinea and placing Muslims against the forest people and Christians," concludes the letter. (L.M.) (Agenzia Fides 30/11/2009)