The Rwandan military said Saturday it had captured 19 armed persons of a Burundian rebel group, Red Tabara, on the Rwandan territory for illegal entry.
The arrested rebels armed with guns crossed from Burundi to neighboring Rwanda on Sept. 29, and were apprehended in Nyungwe forest in Rwanda’s southern district of Nyaruguru, the Rwanda Defense Force said in a statement.
The Rwandan military said it has informed the Expanded Joint Verification Mechanism (EJVM) under the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) about the incident and requested it to verify and investigate the case.
Rwanda has seen sporadic armed attacks in its southern region in recent years.
The illegal crossing of Burundian rebels to Rwanda came just one month after military intelligence chiefs from the two countries met at Nemba One-Stop Border Post to improve relations, which have been on a downswing since 2015 after Burundi accused Rwanda of hosting and supporting perpetrators of the 2015 coup plot against late Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza.
