Burundi parliament approves new political framework

BBC News, 5 June 1998

The leader of Burundi's mainly Hutu opposition party, FRODEBU, has criticised the constitutional changes approved by parliament yesterday, which are designed to pave the way for a power-sharing government.

The FRODEBU president, Jean Minami, speaking from exile in Tanzania, said the changes were designed to undermine the all-party peace talks due to open on June-the-fifteenth.

And a spokesman in Brussels for the main Burundian rebel movement, CNDD, accused the military leader, Major Pierre Buyoya, who seized power in a coup two years ago, of proposing the changes as a way of legitimising his hold on power.