Guinea Junta Chief's Return Could Bring War: France

CAPTAIN MOUSSA DADIS CAMARA Photo: AP.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said on Tuesday it would be better for the wounded leader of Guinea's military junta to stay away from his country as his return could cause a civil war.

Moussa Dadis Camara was rushed to Morocco for treatment after a botched assassination attempt on December 3 by his former aide de camp, leaving a power vacuum and the threat of total chaos in his country, the world's top exporter of bauxite.

"I hope that Mr Dadis Camara stays in his bed in Morocco and does not return home as his return would be capable of triggering a civil war that we really don't need," Kouchner told legislators during a session of questions to the government.

A U.N. report made public on Monday blamed Camara for a September 28 massacre by Guinean security forces of more than 150 pro-democracy marchers in the former French colony.

Camara, who suffered unspecified head wounds during the murder attempt and has not been seen in public since, could face international prosecution for crimes against humanity if the report's findings are followed up.

Kouchner's comment is likely to further fuel speculation that Camara is under Western-backed pressure to go into exile.

The U.N. report, based on 687 interviews conducted by investigators in the capital Conakry and elsewhere in late November and early December, corroborated witness reports that more than 150 people were killed or went missing during a rally.

At least 109 girls and women were subjected to rape, sexual mutilation or sequestration for repeated rape, with hundreds more people subjected to torture and abuse, the report said.

Asked by a legislator what France was doing to ensure that these findings resulted in prosecutions, Kouchner said that the International Criminal Court had taken on the issue of its own accord.

"What can we do? ... We must wait for this issue to go before the Security Council, maybe on Tuesday, and of course there will be sanctions," he said, without elaborating.

Diplomats in New York said on Monday that the French delegation had raised the Guinea report during closed-door consultations among the 15 Security Council members, who took no immediate action.

During a separate news conference earlier on Tuesday, Kouchner said the case should also be taken up by the West African regional bloc ECOWAS and by the African Union.