The Comoros: foreign troops unload on the island of Mohéli
Wednesday December 19, 2001 - 5h21 GMT
MORONI, 19 déc (AFP) - foreign troops unloaded Wednesday morning on the island comorienne of Mohéli, and took control of the army, the gendarmerie and the police force, according to testimonys' on the spot, of which that of a former Prime Minister (well Prime Minister), contacted on the telephone.
The attackers launched leaflets affirming that they were "the army of the United States" and that their intervention was related to the fight against terrorism, according to inhabitants' of the capital, Fomboni, of which the former Prime Minister Mohamed Hassanari, contacted on the telephone at the beginning of morning. The communications with Mohéli were then cut.
Military formation, of almost a hundred men, among whom "of the white, of which some masked", unloaded towards 5h30 local (2h30 GMT), according to these testimonys. It took the control of the army, the gendarmerie, the police force and the post office, according to these sources, which do not specify if the unloading gave place to engagements, and if there were victims.
The identity of the troops which unloaded in Mohéli remains dubious, but leaflets of local origin were distributed here two or three weeks to Moroni, the capital of the Comoros, showing the head of the State, colonel Azali Assoumani, to be related to terrorism.
The leaflets which the soldiers distributed explain in substance why this quota is "the army of the United States", and that its intervention is a response to the "attacks from September 11" in New York and Washington.
"Your president collaborates with the terrorists, we are there to protect you", still indicate the leaflets, which invite the population to return the weapons it would have.
The island of Mohéli forms with Large Comore and Anjouan the Islamic federal Republic of the Comoros (RFIC). Anjouan proclaimed its independence unilaterally in 1997.
This military unloading intervenes at one week of the constitutional referendum envisaged in the Comoros on December 23, 2001, with a little more than three months of the presidential election, fixed at March 31, and the shortly after a visit in the archipelago of the secretary-general of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), the Man from the Ivory Coast Amara Essy.
The referendum must submit to Comoriens a project of constitution, envisaging a framework of the federalistic type granting a very broad autonomy the three islands.
The visit of Mr. Essy, who also went to Mohéli and Anjouan, aimed at "encouraging the comoriennes parts to persevere in their efforts for the implementation of the Outline agreement of Fomboni and, therefore, to put a term at the double separatist crisis (Anjouan) and institutional", specifies the text.
The Outline agreement of Fomboni is an agreement of reconciliation which was signed in February 2001 by the three islands of this archipelago of the Indian Ocean.
The election of the future president of the Republic of the Comoros is fixed at next 31 March, according to the calendar established by the Committee of follow-up in charge of the implementation of the Outline agreement of national reconciliation comorienne and which closed its work last Friday.
The OAU must soon deploy a military mission of observation in the Comoros to supervise the collection of the weapons there on the separatist island of Anjouan.
Wednesday, 19 December, 2001, 05:30 GMT
Armed men take Comoros island
Reports from the Comoros islands off the east coast of Africa say a group of unidentified armed men has landed on one of the islands and seized control.
Journalists contacted by telephone say that the men took over the smallest island in the chain, Moheli, disarming the local police force.
Reports suggested that at least some of the attackers were white and wore masks.
Details of casualties are not known.
The Comoros islands have been politically unstable for several years.
Moheli, together with the island of Anjouan, both declared independence from the rest of the island chain in 1997.
From the newsroom of the BBC World Service