The Central Africa Republic’s shaky interim authorities yesterday ordered all forces except foreign peacekeepers and the presidential guard off the streets of Bangui, where gunfire has eased but attacks on civilians have continued.

A senior UN aid official said French and African peacekeepers must push into neighbourhoods where “senseless” Muslim-Christian killings are rife, not just control the main roads of the capital.

Clashes resumed a day after an African peacekeeper was killed

Clashes resumed in Bossangoa, about 300 km north of Bangui, a day after an African peacekeeper was killed there, a witness there said.

The order for gunmen to return to barracks in Bangui, read on national radio, came as France dispatched 1,200 troops to the country, where at least 300 people have died in two days of violence in which rival militias clashed and then wholescale killings between Muslims and Christians began.

A reinforced French force stepped up patrols of the dilapidated, riverside capital and warplanes flew low overhead.

But residents and rights groups said that killings had taken place on Friday down alleys away from the major arteries.

“Peacekeepers are patrolling the main roads. This is helping keep the looting down. But the atrocities are inside the neighbourhoods,” said Amy Martin, head of the UN Officer for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, OCHA.

“If they can get into the neighbourhoods, we might start seeing a reduction in these crimes. The level of atrocities and the lack of humanity, the senseless killing defies imagination,” Martin said.

A French Defence Ministry source said: “There were patrols all night, including some on foot. We are going everywhere – on the main roads but also to locations we have been directed to by humanitarian organisations and the civilian population.”