Citation
BONN, April 12 (Reuter) - The German ambassador to Rwanda has left the
capital Kigali and travelled to neighbouring Burundi, the foreign
ministry said on Tuesday.
A ministry spokesman said envoy Dieter Hoelscher and his wife had
decided to leave Kigali because tribal fighting was escalating and it
seemed the last opportunity to get out.
Hoelscher would remain in the Burundian capital Bujumbura to coordinate
the rescue of 11 staff members of Germany's Deutsche Welle radio,
trapped in their Kigali office by intense fighting and mined roads.
We are feverishly trying to find a way to evacuate the Deutsche Welle
workers,
the foreign ministry spokesman said.
He said any evacuation would be difficult because there was heavy
fighting in the area where the office was located.
The foreign ministry believed all German nationals apart from the
Deutsche Welle staff known to be living in Rwanda had left the country,
where the rocket-attack killings of the presidents of Burundi and
Rwanda last Wednesday sparked furious bloodletting in which at least
10,000 people have been killed.
German radio reported that a convoy carrying about 80 Germans arrived
early on Tuesday in Bujumbura.
About 120 of the estimated 300 Germans resident in Rwanda were flown
back to Bonn from Bujumbura on Monday. They had travelled on Saturday
in convoys to Bujumbura and were then flown to Bonn in a German army
Airbus plane.
(c) Reuters Limited 1994
