They are protesting the killing of their colleague earlier this week by suspected Séléka gunmen.
The growing insecurity in the Central African Republic, CAR, is beginning to have its toll also on members of the judiciary with the killing last weekend in the capital, Bangui, of a senior magistrate, Modeste Martineau Bria and his orderly, by suspected Séléka gunmen.
To protest the incident, judges in the country on Monday, November 18, 2013, embarked on a month-long strike, the Secretary General of the Central African Republic Magistrates’ Union, Yves Kokoyo, told Radio France Internationale, RFI. He explained that the move was intended to force the authorities to find out the killers and bring them to book. Similarly, judges are to hold a peaceful protest tomorrow Friday, November 22, 2013, to sensitise the public on recent assassination incidents in Bangui.
In a statement on Tuesday, November 19, 2013, the Spokesman for the Presidency, Guy Simplice Kodegue, explained that Modeste Martineau Bria and his orderly were killed on November 18, 2013 in his Ben-Zvi neighbourhood residence when two individuals on a motor bike detonated a grenade. The assailants then collected two rifles and other military equipment before fleeing, he said.
Reacting to the incident, Ben-Zvi residents took to the streets to vent their anger, erecting barricades and burning car tyres. Several people were said to have been injured in the demonstration. In a release later on November 18, 2013, the Minister of Security, Immigration, Emigration and Public Order, Pastor Josué Binoua, announced that three gunmen involved in the killing of the magistrate and his orderly were shot dead by security forces while trying to resist arrest.
The landlocked nation has been mired in chaos since Séléka ousted President François Bozizé last March before being dissolved. The country has seen an increase in clashes between former rebels - who are mostly Moslems - and local Christian self-defence groups. African nations have deployed troops in the country, but diplomats say they cannot cope with the anarchy and that UN peacekeepers are needed. Both the US and celebrity campaigner, Mia Farrow, who recently visited the country, have warned of impending genocide. Farrow describes the country as a “failed state” whose people have been abandoned.
