Congo clashes hit hopes of a cease-fire

Bodies were littering the streets after four days of fighting in the capital Brazzaville, a relief worker in Kinshasa said.

The aid worker in the capital of the former Zaire said he was in frequent contact via walkie-talkie with colleagues across the Congo river in Brazzaville.

Forces loyal to Congolese opposition leader Denis Sassou Nguesso took control overnight of the government headquarters, a close associate of the former President Ambroise Noumazalay, claimed today.

Noumazalay told this agency the opposition forces now controlled “much more than half” of Brazzaville.

He was contacted from Kinshasa, the capital of the neighbouring democratic republic of Congo, formerly Zaire.

Brazzaville has been rocked by heavy fighting between the government forces of President Pascal Lissouba and Sassou Nguesso’s faction since early Thursday.

Prime Minister David Charles Ganao, called for a cease-fire in a televised speech on Saturday.

He said Lissouba had accepted an offer of mediation by Gabon’s President Omar Bongo.

France, the former colonial power, lent its support to the mediation effort on Saturday.

Meanwhile, France is sending around 500 more soldiers to Brazzaville, foreign ministry of France said in Paris.

France’s decision to send more troops to its former colony followed the death of a French soldier in a firefight and reports from French nationals who fled the city of hostility towards them there.