Guinea Bissau troops pound Senegal rebels on borderSAO DOMINGOS, Guinea Bissau, March 19 (Reuters) - Guinea Bissau troops used rockets and mortars at the weekend to bombard southern Senegal separatist rebels in a border zone, killing at least one of the rebels, an officer said on Sunday.
Four Guinea Bissau troops were also injured in the clashes, which have raged for several days around Sao Domingos town near the frontier with Senegal's southern Casamance region, where rebels have fought a low-intensity separatist war for years.
Several soldiers, rebels and civilians have died in the fighting since last Tuesday and hundreds of civilians have fled the zone, more than 450 taking refuge in Ziguinchor, the main town in Senegal's Casamance region.
A commander in the Guinea Bissua army, Antonio Ndiaye, told Reuters his soldiers were trying to clear a border stronghold belonging to hardline Casamance separatist chief Salif Sadio, who has refused to negotiate peace with Senegal's government.
They were using Soviet-made Katyusha multiple rocket launchers, popularly known as "Stalin Organs", and mortars to pound the Senegalese rebels, whom Ndiaye said had attacked an army position inside Guinea Bissau earlier on Sunday.
"There has been fighting since yesterday in the Baraca Mandioca zone where Sadio's rebels are holed up," Ndiaye said.
He blamed the rebels for laying a landmine which exploded under a minibus taxi outside of Sao Domingos on Thursday, killing 12 people. At least three houses in the town had also been set on fire by the fighting between troops and rebels.
Sadio's fighters, who had come under attack inside Senegal since Tuesday from rival factions of the Movement of Democratic Forces of Casamance (MFDC), had moved across the border west of Sao Domingos, cutting the road to Varela, Ndiaye said.
He addded they had been assaulting and robbing traders inside Guinea Bissau, a former Portuguese colony.
Guinea Bissau's Defence Minister Helder Proenca on Thursday explained the army offensive against Sadio's group by saying his country would not allow its territory to be used to destabilise its neighbour Senegal.
The border area is heavily mined after years of unrest in both Guinea Bissau and Senegal's Casamance, where the separatist rebels have fought a 24-year insurgency.
Armed dissidents from both countries have in the past moved backwards and forwards over the border area, where local tribal and political loyalties are often more influential than modern national borders originally imposed by European colonists.
The MFDC took up arms against Senegal's central government in 1982, accusing it of neglecting Casamance, which is separated from the rest of the former French colony by tiny, wedge-shaped Gambia, previously a British colony.
The rebellion has simmered since, reaching its peak in the 1990s. Hundreds of people have been killed and scores maimed by landmines that litter the countryside. (Additional reporting by Diadie Ba in Dakar)
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Auteur: Alberto Dabo - Xibar.net
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SAO DOMINGOS, Guinea Bissau, March 19 (Reuters) - Guinea Bissau troops used rockets and mortars at the weekend to bombard southern Senegal separatist rebels in a border zone, killing at least one of the rebels, an officer said on Sunday.
Four Guinea Bissau troops were also injured in the clashes, which have raged for several days around Sao Domingos town near the frontier with Senegal's southern Casamance region, where rebels have fought a low-intensity separatist war for years.
Several soldiers, rebels and civilians have died in the fighting since last Tuesday and hundreds of civilians have fled the zone, more than 450 taking refuge in Ziguinchor, the main town in Senegal's Casamance region.
A commander in the Guinea Bissua army, Antonio Ndiaye, told Reuters his soldiers were trying to clear a border stronghold belonging to hardline Casamance separatist chief Salif Sadio, who has refused to negotiate peace with Senegal's government.
They were using Soviet-made Katyusha multiple rocket launchers, popularly known as "Stalin Organs", and mortars to pound the Senegalese rebels, whom Ndiaye said had attacked an army position inside Guinea Bissau earlier on Sunday.
"There has been fighting since yesterday in the Baraca Mandioca zone where Sadio's rebels are holed up," Ndiaye said.
He blamed the rebels for laying a landmine which exploded under a minibus taxi outside of Sao Domingos on Thursday, killing 12 people. At least three houses in the town had also been set on fire by the fighting between troops and rebels.
Sadio's fighters, who had come under attack inside Senegal since Tuesday from rival factions of the Movement of Democratic Forces of Casamance (MFDC), had moved across the border west of Sao Domingos, cutting the road to Varela, Ndiaye said.
He addded they had been assaulting and robbing traders inside Guinea Bissau, a former Portuguese colony.
Guinea Bissau's Defence Minister Helder Proenca on Thursday explained the army offensive against Sadio's group by saying his country would not allow its territory to be used to destabilise its neighbour Senegal.
The border area is heavily mined after years of unrest in both Guinea Bissau and Senegal's Casamance, where the separatist rebels have fought a 24-year insurgency.
Armed dissidents from both countries have in the past moved backwards and forwards over the border area, where local tribal and political loyalties are often more influential than modern national borders originally imposed by European colonists.
The MFDC took up arms against Senegal's central government in 1982, accusing it of neglecting Casamance, which is separated from the rest of the former French colony by tiny, wedge-shaped Gambia, previously a British colony.
The rebellion has simmered since, reaching its peak in the 1990s. Hundreds of people have been killed and scores maimed by landmines that litter the countryside. (Additional reporting by Diadie Ba in Dakar) 
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