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Rebels Agree To Cease-Fire In Chad, Report Says

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By TOM MALITI, The Associated Press

Published: February 3, 2008

NAIROBI, Kenya - Hundreds of rebels charged into Chad's capital aboard pickups Saturday, clashing with government troops around the presidential palace in the most forceful attempt yet to oust President Idriss Deby. The rebels claimed to gain strength from defecting soldiers in the oil-rich Central African nation.

Libya's official news agency JANA, a mouthpiece for the government, reported Chadian rebel leader Mahamat Nouri agreed to a cease-fire Saturday night after speaking to Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, who was appointed by the African Union to mediate the crisis.

There was no immediate way to verify the report with the rebels or the Chadian government.

The violence endangered a $300 million global aid operation supporting millions of people in the former French colony and delayed the deployment of the European Union's peacekeeping mission to Chad and neighboring Central African Republic.

The rebels arrived after a three-day push across the desert from the eastern border with Sudan in about 250 pickups with mounted submachine guns.

Rebels gathered outside N'Djamena overnight before 1,000 to 1,500 fighters entered early Saturday and spread through the city, said Col. Thierry Burkhard, a French military spokesman.

Government forces were pushing rebels away from N'Djamena, he said late Saturday. "It appears clear that President Deby succeeded in containing them at his palace and is even in the process of pushing them back," Burkhard said.

A bomb hit the residence of the Saudi ambassador to Chad, killing the wife and daughter of an embassy staff member taking shelter from the fighting, according to a Saudi Foreign Ministry statement.

Chad's ambassador in Ethiopia, Cherif Mahamat Zene, told The Associated Press that "the situation is under control.

"The head of state is fine in his palace. It's true that there are some rebels who have entered the city, but to say the city has fallen is false." Zene said his information came from a telephone call with the defense minister in N'Djamena.

A spokesman for the biggest rebel group told the AP that its forces had surrounded the presidential palace and claimed that government soldiers were defecting.

"Many in the military have rallied with the rebels," said Mahamat Hassane Boulmaye of the Union of Forces for Democracy and Development. He was reached on a Sudanese mobile telephone number and said he was on Chad's border with Sudan.

The African Union, holding a summit in Ethiopia, said it would not recognize the rebels should they seize power. Tanzania's President Jakaya Kikwete, new head of the 52-nation bloc, said leaders had selected Gadhafi and Republic of Congo President Denis Sassou-Nguesso to try to broker peace.

The U.S. Embassy urged Americans seeking evacuation to get to the embassy. State Department spokesman Karl Duckworth said the embassy had authorized the departure of nonessential personnel and family members.

The United Nations decided to temporarily evacuate its staff, said William Spindler, spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, but "since there is fighting going on, it might be difficult to carry it out." Spindler said 51 U.N. staff were evacuated to Cameroon overnight.

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