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About 150 police left the Congolese town of Bunia after being asked to withdraw by an international force sent to safeguard civilians from ethnic bloodletting, the force said on Sunday.
The government in Kinshasa sent 112 armed police reinforcements to Bunia on Friday, a move the international force said violated a peace deal signed in May by the government and militias fighting over the town.
The arrival of the police sparked a protest by about 100 residents on Saturday, who said they considered the police as members of the Congolese army, which they accuse of backing gunmen allied to the ethnic Lendu tribe.
Bunia is in the hands of the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC), a militia allied to the Hema community which seized the town from Lendu fighters in May during an outbreak of violence in the area that killed hundreds.
A spokesman for the international force, which is mostly French and began deploying on June 6, said the Congolese government had agreed to withdraw its entire police force from the town, which is based at Bunia’s airport.
“One hundred and fifty left yesterday,” said the deputy spokesman for the mission, Major Xavier Pons. “The rest should depart within the next few days, which means it will be the multi-national force which will be guarding the airport,” he told reporters.
UN observers in Bunia say the exact size of the police force at the airport is unclear, though it might number around 200. The police are expected to go back to Kinshasa.
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