Word: bokassa
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...Emperor since the deposition and death of Ethiopia's Haile Selassie. Sweltering in the 100° heat and 90% humidity, the guests, in morning coats and Parisian gowns, struggled to attention as a voice boomed out over the loudspeaker: "Sa Majesté Impériale, I'Empereur Bokassa Premier...
...that "the fundamental interests in the two countries are identical." Recent speeches by Soviet officials have been notable for the absence of any political references that could offend Peking. This new diplomatic approach has yet to be reciprocated. At a Peking banquet last week for Jean-Bédel Bokassa, President of the Central African Republic, Chinese Vice Premier Li Hsien-nien accused the Soviets of "criminal actions" in Africa and of offering China "nothing but threats." The Soviet ambassador stalked out of the banquet...
...charges of brutal, disfiguring tortures in Iraq, especially in Baghdad's Kasr-al-Nihaya Prison. In many black African countries, few torture victims survive to tell their stories. In such one-man dictatorships as Francisco Macias Nguema's Equatorial Guinea, Idi Amin's Uganda, Jean Bedel Bokassa's Central African Republic and Ahmed Sekou Toure's Republic of Guinea, unimaginably cruel, capricious and unpredictable tortures are everyday occurrences. In tiny Equatorial Guinea, which has suffered a reign of terror since gaining independence eight years ago, political prisoners have had their eyes gouged out by torturers...
...Bokassa's attempts to improve the livelihood of his people are not nearly as impressive as his efforts to keep them politically subdued. Last week the President celebrated his 53rd birthday by inaugurating, to the beat of tribal drums, a new diamond-cutting plant. But the $15 million in foreign exchange brought in by diamond production last year is the only bright spot in an otherwise abysmal economy. Fully 90% of the people still live outside the cash economy, while Bokassa too often devotes himself to showy but nonbasic ventures. For example, as part of his birthday celebration...
...Bokassa has the C.A.R. so cowed that he now feels secure enough to show up in town without his usual four carloads of bodyguards, wearing khakis instead of the customary dress uniform ostentatiously covered with medals. Some observers feel that he has mellowed with the years, but most of his subjects very sensibly remain wary. "He is secure for now," says a student at the C.A.R.'s only university, which is named, of course, for Bokassa, "but the moment a threat appears to his power, then you will see the old Bokassa once more: cruel, arrogant and ruthless...