Conakry - At least five people were shot and wounded in Guinea's capital Conakry on Monday, a government spokesman said, during protests against the timing of elections and what opposition figures say is targeted violence against them.
Protesters barricaded streets and burned tyres overnight in Conakry neighbourhoods considered opposition strongholds. Security forces moved in to clear the streets, firing teargas as protesters threw stones.
Several witnesses reported hearing gunfire and a government spokesman confirmed gunshot victims had been admitted to two Conakry hospitals.
“There's shooting here. We are barricaded inside our houses,” one witness said, asking not to be named.
Government spokesman Damantang Albert Camara said five people had been shot.
“For the moment we don't know where the shots came from,” he said, adding that gendarmes had come under fire in the city's Hamdallaye neighbourhood, although none had been hit.
A police vehicle was damaged and one member of the security forces injured by stone-throwing demonstrators, he said.
Guinea's electoral commission announced last month that a presidential election would be held on October 11, a decision the opposition said broke a July 2013 agreement to hold long-delayed local elections first.
“We won't stop. We are calling for the demonstrations to continue tomorrow until our demands are totally satisfied,” opposition figure Cellou Dalien told journalists.
President Alpha Conde's call for a return to dialogue was rebuffed by the opposition.
“Dialogue ended ... with the signing of the agreements. Alpha Conde just has to implement them,” said Sidya Toure, a former prime minister and now a member of the opposition.
Presidential and legislative elections since 2010, when Guinea emerged from decades of military rule, have been marred by violent protests, with parties divided along ethnic lines.
The opposition called Monday's protests last week after unidentified gunmen attacked the vehicle of Aboubacar Sylla, an opposition spokesman, in what they said was an assassination attempt.
Reuters