BANGUI: At least 12 people were killed in Central African Republic on Tuesday when rebel fighters ambushed and set fire to three semi-trucks ferrying passengers from a regional capital, a local official said.
The vehicles were traveling to the small town of Alindao from Bambari, the seat of the war-torn Ouaka prefecture, when militants linked to the Coalition of Patriots for Change (CPC) attacked from the forest, prefect Victor Bissekoin said on Wednesday.
“This is very unfortunate because innocent people lost their lives,” Bissekoin said. “The provisional toll is 12 dead and several wounded, and it is likely that the wounded will die.”
Medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), which supports Bambari’s main hopsital, said on Wednesday that the facility received 15 dead bodies and seven patients with gunshot wounds following Tuesday’s attack.
Among the dead was a 5-year old child, MSF said.
“MSF has no information about the incident that resulted in the deaths and injuries, but we are concerned about the impact of the ongoing violence in CAR on civilians,” the statement said.
Images circulated online showed the charred cab of a semi-truck surrounded by at least 10 unburned bodies, suggesting they died away from the blaze. Reuters could not confirm the authenticity of the images.
The CPC rebels could not be reached for comment.
A representative of the UN mission in Central African Republic (MINUSCA) confirmed that the attack had taken place, but did not provide further details.
The gold- and diamond-rich nation of 4.7 million people has suffered bouts of heavy violence since former President Francois Bozize was ousted in 2013. Hundreds of thousands have been displaced.
The current fighting between a coalition of militias and the national army was sparked by a Constitutional Court decision to bar Bozize from running in last year’s presidential election, in which President Faustin-Archange Touadera won a second term.
At least 12 killed in Central African Republic road ambush
https://arab.news/898jm
At least 12 killed in Central African Republic road ambush
Russia strikes power plant, kills four in Ukraine barrage
KHARKIV: Russia battered Ukraine with more than two dozen missiles and hundreds of drones early Tuesday, killing four people and pummelling another power plant, piling more pressure on Ukraine’s brittle energy system.
An AFP journalist in the eastern Kharkiv region, where four people were killed, saw firefighters battling a fire at a postal hub and rescue workers helping survivors by lamp light in freezing temperatures.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said “several hundred thousand” households near Kyiv were without power after the strikes, and again called on allies to bolster his country’s air defense systems.
“The world can respond to this Russian terror with new assistance packages for Ukraine,” President Volodymyr Zelensky wrote on social media.
“Russia must come to learn that cold will not help it win the war,” he added.
Authorities in Kyiv and the surrounding region rolled out emergency power cuts in the hours after the attack, saying freezing temperatures were complicating their work.
DTEK, Ukraine’s largest energy provider, said Russian forces had struck one of its power plants, saying it was the eighth such attack since October.
The operator did not reveal which of its plants was struck, but said Russia had attacked its power plants over 220 times since Moscow invaded Ukraine in 2022.
Daily attacks
Moscow has pummelled Ukraine with daily drone and missile barrages in recent months, targeting energy infrastructure and cutting power and heating in the frigid height of winter.
The Ukrainian air force said that Tuesday’s bombardment included 25 missiles and 247 drones.
The Kharkiv governor gave the death toll and added that six people were wounded in the overnight hit outside the region’s main city, also called Kharkiv.
White helmeted emergency workers could be seen clambering through the still-smoking wreckage of a building occupied by postal company Nova Poshta, in a video posted by the regional prosecutor’s office.
Within Ukraine’s second city, Kharkiv Mayor Igor Terekhov said a Russian long-range drone struck a medical facility for children, causing a fire. No casualties were reported.
The overnight strikes hit other regions as well, including southern city Odesa.
Residential buildings, a hospital and a kindergarten were damaged, with at least five people wounded in two waves of attacks, regional governor Sergiy Lysak said.
Russia’s use last week of a nuclear-capable Oreshnik ballistic missile on Ukraine sparked condemnation from Kyiv’s allies, including Washington, which called it a “dangerous and inexplicable escalation of this war.”
Moscow on Monday said the missile hit an aviation repair factory in the Lviv region and that it was fired in response to Ukraine’s attempt to strike one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s residences — a claim Kyiv denies and that Washington has said it does not believe happened.
