ICC Note:

Suspected Christian youths have destroyed the last remaining mosque in the Central African Republic’s capital city of Bangui in a suspected act of reprisal to an attack perpetrated Wednesday by suspected Séléka remnants on Notre Dame de Fatima, which resulted in the deaths of 30 Christians. A known shelter for those seeking refuge from the sectarian violence that has plagued the streets of Bangui for months, Notre Dame de Fatima became a bloodied scene of bullet holes and obliterated corpses after suffered hails of gunfire and lobbed grenades. Lawlessness continues to perpetuate tit-for-tat exchanges between Islamic militants and anti-balaka (or anti-machete) militias following the ousting of the Séléka regime, which took power March of 2013, earlier this year when then-President Michel Djotodia resigned and fled the country in January.

05/29/2014 Central African Republic (AP) – A group of Christian youth destroyed one of the last mosques in Central African Republic’s capital on Thursday, hours after Muslim rebels launched a grenade and gunfire attack on a Catholic church, officials and residents said.

Ousmane Abakar, a spokesman for Bangui’s small remaining Muslim community, denounced the Wednesday attack on the church and denied that local Muslims were to blame.

“For six months we have been the ones subjected to violence and the destruction of our mosques, including the one ruined in the Lakouanga neighborhood this morning,” he said.

Tens of thousands of Muslims have fled the capital in a mass exodus this year following scores of attacks by Christian militia fighters who blamed them for supporting a brutal Muslim rebel regime that was ousted from power in January.

Wednesday’s attack on the Notre Dame de Fatima church was a rare large-scale assault on a Christian community in Bangui. At least 15 people were killed including a priest at the church, according to the Rev. Jonas Bekas. It was not immediately possible to confirm the total death toll, as some victims were brought to hospitals and other civilians were abducted by the fighters.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon strongly condemned the church attack, as well as another brutal assault by Christian militia fighters that killed three Muslims who were on their way to an inter-communal reconciliation soccer match.

“The Secretary-General calls for an immediate end to the cycle of violence and retaliatory attacks,” said a statement from Ban’s spokesman.

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