Bujumbura : at least three dead in grenade explosion

Three people were killed, 14 others injured in a grenade explosion that targeted a public transport bus parking lot in the commercial city Bujumbura. It took place early Friday evening. Another explosion occurred not far from a police camp for the protection of the institutions. Several people were arrested, according to witnesses. INFO SOS Médias Burundi

The first explosion targeted a bus parking lot full of passengers waiting in vain for a bus at a time when fuel shortages are at their peak in the small East African nation. It was shortly after 7:20 p.m.

“Three people died, 14 others were injured,” security sources said. They are confirmed by activists from the CNDD-FDD, the presidential party, who had access to the scene of the attack.

According to an SOS Médias Burundi reporter, several streets were blocked after this explosion.

“Several people were arrested, the police make no distinction, women, men, young people, any suspicious person is arrested immediately,” noted a colleague from a local media who was not far from the the old central market of Bujumbura at the time of the explosion.

According to our reporter, many police vehicles were deployed in the city center on Friday evening.

Witnesses say that at the time of the explosion, all the passengers who were in the parking lot of buses serving the north of the economic capital fled at full speed.

“People are running in all directions, just like vehicles,” testified an employee of a local radio station located in the center of Bujumbura.

“I had just arrived at the parking lot when the grenade exploded. Everyone was running in all directions. The cars were running too. It was terrible,” says a young shoe trader.

Downtown streets became deserted in less than 20 minutes, witnesses reported.

Another explosion, an arrest

Within half an hour, another grenade exploded in the Ngagara zone north of the economic capital. Police sources confirm that the device exploded not far from a camp of the Support Group for the Protection of Institutions (GAPI).

“The perpetrators of the explosion was injured by shrapnel. He was arrested immediately. When he was arrested, his cell phone was ringing. Agents from the intelligence service immediately took him to the secret service cell “, police sources told SOS Médias Burundi. The camp is also located next to the Police Officers’ Mess.

In recent days, devices placed in electrical cabins in Bujumbura have exploded, causing only material damage. And it was less than a week since two more people were injured in a grenade explosion in the northern commercial city.
https://www.sosmediasburundi.org/2024/05/05/bujumbura-deux-personnel-blessees-dans-une-explosion/

Administrative and security officials have never spoken openly about these incidents. The Burundian authorities had not yet communicated the official results of the two detonations on Friday until the publication of this article.