Word: habre
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...nine months, the sputtering civil war in the Central African nation of Chad had been conducted with little enthusiasm. The two brigade-size guerrilla groups-one led by President Goukouni Oueddei, the other by insurgent Defense Minister Hissène Habré-had reached a virtual stalemate in their listless battle for control of the impoverished, landlocked country of 4.5 million. Fighting mainly over the capital of N'Djamena on the Chari River, the two miniarmies regularly exchanged artillery duels, and then, just as regularly, stopped shooting for lunch, tea and dinner breaks...
...ended an uneasy truce between warring guerrilla armies. The principal antagonists are two rival leaders who are members of Chad's own central government: President Goukouni Oueddei and Defense Minister Hissene Habré. The two ex-soldiers once fought as Muslim allies during the country's 14-year civil war. Now they are locked in a personal power struggle, with their respective forces (Oueddei's 6,800; Habré's 5,000) shelling each other's urban strongholds...
Armed largely by Libya's Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, the northern-based Muslim guerrillas had succeeded last March in ousting President Félix Malloum, one of the southern Christians who have monopolized the government since Chad received its independence from France in 1960. Muslim Leaders Oueddei and Habré have since shared power in an eleven-faction alliance marked by mutual suspicion and hostility...
Chad's warring leaders not only are locked in a power struggle, but also are seen as proxies of two foreign nations with rival interests throughout Africa: the sophisticated, Paris-educated Habré is associated with the French, while the ascetic revolutionary Oueddei is presumed to be close to the Libyans...