Burundi’s exiles call world’s attention to deadly crisis
KIGALI, Rwanda — Burundi-born Eric Ndayisenga and his friends in exile religiously listen to a radio station that urges liberation from the deadly political violence back home. One day the report brought grief instead.
His sister Zainabu and a friend had been found dead, stabbed and their throats slit, in Burundi’s capital, Bujumbura.
Ndayisenga believes his sister’s fate would have been unknown if not reported by the station linked to the Forebu rebel group, supported by exiles who press the international community to act on Burundi’s crisis.
Hundreds of people have been killed and hundreds of thousands have fled the small East African nation in the two years since President Pierre Nkurunziza set off protests by declaring he would seek another term. After the armed forces put down an attempted coup, he won election amid alleged revenge killings and the unrest has continued.