Five months ago in Burundi, on 1 November 2001, a transitional national government was inaugurated in which the majority Hutu ethnic group would share power with the minority Tutsi, who have dominated politics for most of the country's 39 years of independence from Belgium. IRIN asked Senate President Bararunyeretse about the role of the Senate in moving the country away from years of civil war towards peace and stability. Also discussed was the ongoing repatriation of Burundi refugees from camps in western Tanzania, as part of a tripartite agreement between the UN agency and the governments of both countries.

Some 4,800 families have been displaced in Rushubi town in Isare District, in Bujumbura Rural, east of Burundi's capital, Bujumbura, a humanitarian source reported local authorities as saying on Wednesday.

Fighting was still going on Monday between Burundi army and rebels of the Forces nationale de liberation (FNL) in Nyambuye, an area within Bujumbura-Rural, adjacent to the Burundi capital Bujumbura, sources confirmed to IRIN on Monday.

Members of the Congolese Banyamulenge community recently arrested by police in Burundi are not refugees officially recognised by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the agency's representative in Burundi, Stefano Severe, told IRIN on Thursday.

In 2001, Burundi "remained profoundly affected by massive violations of human rights, in particular the right to life, due principally to the continued civil war between the national armed forces and the two principal armed [rebel] factions, the Front national de liberation (FNL) and the Forces pour la defense de la democratie (FDD)", Ligue Iteka, a local human rights organisation, stated in its newly released annual report.

Sixteen women were elected to Burundi’s Transitional Assembly last month. The elected women were candidates from 14 political parties and members of civil society. The elections come after intense years of lobbying by the women of Burundi, supported by UNIFEM and other partners, for the inclusion of women in decision-making and their participation in the Burundi peace process.

The acting World Health Organisation (WHO) representative in Burundi, Dr Lamine Diarra, is under house arrest, the United Nations Development Programme Resident Representative, Georg Charpentier, confirmed to IRIN on Friday.

Burundian Communications Minister Albert Mbonerane on Saturday lifted the suspension of the right of the private news agency Net Press to publish or post news on its web site, Net Press Editor-in-Chief Claude Sibomana told IRIN on Monday.

A faction of the Conseil national pour la défense de la démocratie-Forces pour la défense de la démocratie (CNDD-FDD) and the transitional government on Friday 22 February agreed on a general framework of negotiations intended to lead, as soon as possible, to a definite agreement on a cease-fire and the restoration of democracy in Burundi.

The European Commission (EC) is to donate US $15.3 million in humanitarian aid to Burundi, a press release from the EC stated on Friday.

"Burundi's new transitional government must not waste an historic opportunity to end the blight of torture and impunity," Amnesty International has said as it made public a Memorandum addressed to Burundi's transitional authorities and the international community.

The transitional government of Burundi, installed November 1, inherited an eight-year-old civil war and an expanding and abusive "self-defense" program purportedly meant to protect civilians against rebel attack. The program includes the rural-based paramilitary "Guardians of the Peace" which have committed many killings, rapes, and other crimes over the last four years. HRW's report, "To Protect the People: The Government sponsored 'self-defense' program in Burundi," documents cases of forced conscription, the use of child soldiers, and atrocities committed by the "Guardians of the Peace." The report calls on the government of Burundi, to disband the paramilitary force. Prior to the release of the report, authors Alison DesForges and Tony Tate presented advance copies to the Burundian Minister of Defense, and officials at the Belgian and US embassies, the US AID administrator in Burundi and the local UN representative. Alison also discussed the reports findings and recommendations with diplomats and officials in Brussels, New York, and Washington, and conducted radio interviews with the BBC, RFI, and VOA and with the two major private radio stations in Bujumbura which were broadcast repeatedly. The report was also covered by the New York Times. President Buyoya's remark that Human Rights Watch had a right to its opinion but would not dictate policy to his government was reported both locally and in the European press.

Burundi will pull its troops out of the Democratic Republic of Congo, its government has announced. In exchange for that commitment, the authorities in Kinshasa have pledged to stop supporting Burundian rebels on Congolese soil.

Government-sponsored paramilitary forces known as “Guardians of the Peace” have committed many killings, rapes, and other crimes over the last four years in Burundi, Human Rights Watch have charged.

Although the army said it could not yet give an accurate casualty figure in its drive to flush out rebels from a forest near the capital, Bujumbura, news organisations have reported at least 100 rebels and 30 government troops killed since the operation began nine days ago.

UNIFEM and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), in collaboration with ABANTU for Development, an African women’s NGO, held a ‘Peace and Communications Skills Workshop for Burundi Refugee Women’ from 1-4 October. The need for the workshop resulted from a UNIFEM Training Needs Assessment Mission for Burundi Refugee Women, conducted in June-July 2001. While the target beneficiaries were Burundi refugee women and men in Kibondo, Kasulu and Ngara refugee camps in Tanzania, participants also included key implementing partners of UNHCR who have a direct bearing on the lives of refugee women in the camps.

At least 1,700 people fleeing rampaging rebels in the communes of Kiremba and Gasorwe arrived in the nearby northeastern Burundi town of Muyinga on Monday where most of them were sheltered in two primary schools, humanitarian sources told IRIN.

The head of the UN World Health Organisation's operations in Burundi, Kassi Manlan of the Ivory Coast, was found dead in Bujumbura on Tuesday.

Whilst the world's attention is directed towards Afghanistan and the wider fall-out of the events of 11 September in the United States of America, Amnesty International today urged the international community not to ignore Burundi, where the short period since the commencement of a government of transition on 1 November has been marked by massacres of civilians by government forces and the abduction of hundreds of children by an armed political group.

Burundian troops have killed 162 rebels in five days of fighting in the provinces of Ruyigi and Bururi, army spokesman Col. Augustin Nzabampema told IRIN on Thursday.