Police in Burundi's capital Bujumbura fired tear gas at crowds today, protesting against the massacre of at least 160 Congolese Tutsis at a United Nations refugee camp in the west of the country.
About 100 Congolese Tutsis, known as Banyamulenge, gathered outside the Democratic Republic of Congo embassy in the lakeside city to denounce the Friday night attack which Burundi blames on Hutu rebels and allied militias from eastern Congo.
The extremist Hutu rebel group, the Forces for National Liberation (FNL), claimed responsibility for the attack in which people were hacked, shot and burnt to death.
"We're demonstrating to show our suffering, but the police are brutalising us with tear gas," said Mr Arthur Mugisha, one of the protesters.
"We're demanding that the United Nations intervene because Tutsis continue to be massacred in the Great Lakes region," he said.
Demonstrators carried placards saying "What did the UNHCR do to protect the refugees?" and "President Kabila's silence, complicity in genocide", referring to the UN refugee agency and DCR President Mr Joseph Kabila.
Mr Kabila called on Saturday for an international inquiry into the slaughter.
Ethnic divide has long been at the heart of conflict in the Great Lakes.
The attack on the refugee camp, sheltering 2,500 to 3,000 people who had fled eastern Congo fearing ethnic persecution, was among central Africa's worst in years.
A Burundian government spokesman said on Wednesday the tiny coffee-producing country would urge regional leaders attending a summit in neighbouring Tanzania to impose sanctions against the FNL.
The summit is expected to focus on how to deal with the FNL, the only group still fighting the government, as well as Burundi's slow peace process paving the way for elections due later this year.