- Relative calm has returned to Guinea-Bissau after yesterday's mutiny, in which Army Chief Veríssimo Correia Seabra allegedly was killed. The rebel soldiers, who yesterday mounted a mutiny over late salaries, today are to negotiate with Bissau authorities. Meanwhile, the UN Security Council is set to discuss the crisis in an extraordinary session and Portuguese speaking countries are to mediate.
According to unconfirmed reports from the Guinean capital, Bissau, Army Chief Seabra and Army Information Cief Domingos Barros were killed in a shoot-out between the rebels and ordinary troops yesterday. The government of Guinea-Bissau however still has not confirmed the death of the two army leaders. General Seabra last year led a military coup in the country and for several months headed Guinea-Bissau's transitional government.
An unknown number of mutineers of the Bissau-Guinean army yesterday were involved in negotiations over payments with the army leadership. Shortly after General Seabra had announced a dusk-to-dawn curfew due to the negotiation failure, gun fight started in the barracks. The two generals and an unknown number of other are said to have been killed.
During the night and morning, however, only minor incidents have been reported from Bissau. The local UN representative, João Bernardo Honwana of Mozambique, today managed to get representatives from the mutineers and the Bissau-Guinean government to the negotiation table. The talks were reported to include Interim President Henrique Rosa and Prime Minister Carlos Gomes Junior.
According to a statement by the Prime Minister, the mutiny principally had been the result of late and small payments for a group of Bissau-Guinean soldiers that had served as UN peacekeepers in Liberia. While having served nine months in Liberia, the troops still had only been paid for three months, Mr Gomes said, referring to the mutineers' claims. Some 500 soldiers from Guinea-Bissau had served for the UN in Liberia.
Alarmed by the renewed violence in Guinea-Bissau, several international initiatives have already been launched to halt the rebellion. Guinea-Bissau is in a fragile transition process towards democracy and economic revival and expects to hold presidential polls in March 2005. The UN and other partners have invested large sums in re-establishing stability in the poverty-ridden country.
The first initiative to solve the crisis was made by the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP), which is sending a mission led by José Ramos Horta of Timor Leste and Ovídeo Pequeno of São Tomé and Príncipe. The mission is to reach Bissau late today and will try to facilitate talks between the government and the mutineers.
Also the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) has been alerted by the renewed violence in Guinea-Bissau. The ECOWAS Security Council today is analysing the crisis and the community is sending a delegation to Bissau headed by the Foreign Ministers of Nigeria and Senegal. The ECOWAS mission is expected to get tough on the mutineers, reminding them that armed insurgences are not longer tolerated in the region.
Finally, the UN Security Council today is set to organise an extraordinary meeting to analyse the situation in Guinea-Bissau. The session had been called for by Portugal, according to information from the Lisbon-based new agency Lusa. The Security Council since 1999 has followed the situation in Guinea-Bissau closely, although without any forceful attempts to stop emerging crises in the country.
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