Citation
NAIROBI, Nov 10 (AFP) - Burundian health minister Jean Minani has embarked on a tour of several African and European countries to discuss measures to restore constitutional order in his country after a coup attempt, Rwandan radio reported Wednesday.
According to the radio monitored here, Minani arrived in Cairo on Tuesday night as an emissary of the Burundian government and will from there go on to Tunisia, Morocco, Senegal, France, Germany and Belgium.
Burundi has been gripped with ethnic fighting between majority Hutus and minority Tutsis since the October 21 coup attempt by the Tutsi-dominated army in which President Melchior Ndadaye and several of his ministers were killed.
Ndadaye was the first president from the majority Hutu tribe since Burundi's independence from Belgian rule in 1962.
International relief agencies believe thousands of people were massacred in the subsequent ethnic strife that also triggered an exodus of more than 600,000 refugees to neighbouring Tanzania, Rwanda and Zaire.
Remaining ministers who survived the coup, including Prime Minister Sylvie Kanigi, left the French embassy in Bujumbura at the weekend where they had been holed up since the coup, demanding international protection.
They finally agreed to leave the embassy after some 15 French military advisers arrived in the capital to train Burundian forces in protecting the country's leadership.
lto/ap
