At least 16 people were reportedly killed and twenty others injured in northern Central African Republic in an attack blamed on armed Fulani herdsmen and mainly Muslim Seleka militia.
According to AFP, the victims for most armed Fulani, were killed in clashes that are believed to have started last Sunday and extended to Monday.
The attack, confirmed by local media, was the worst unrest since presidential and parliamentary elections in February and March, viewed as a key step to reconciliation after the sectarian trouble.
On Monday, heavily armed members of the former rebel group Seleka took six police officers hostage in Bangui.
According to AFP correspondent in Bangui, the operation carried out by local and international security forces with heavy firearms in the PK5 Muslim neighborhood has driven away hundreds of residents in neighboring communities to other districts of Bangui in the afternoon.
The police said three people have been shot dead in the operation
Last week, at least ten people were killed and several others injured in an attack by suspected Fulani and ex-Seleka rebels in the western part of the country.
Landlocked Central African Republic, one of the world’s poorest, was plunged into chaos by the March 2013 ousting of long-serving president Francois Bozize, a Christian, by the mainly Muslim Seleka rebel alliance.
A fifth of the population fled their homes due to violence and the country, largely divided along religious lines, remains controlled by warlords.
More than 400,000 people have been internally displaced, and some half-a-million have fled to neighboring countries such as Chad, Cameroon and the Democratic Republic of Congo, UN said.