GALLO, Central African Republic—It was about 5 p.m. on a very warm Sunday evening in mid-September in Koki, a small town in the northwest of the Central African Republic (CAR), when the servant of a local traditional chief arrived at the home of a man we will call Alioum* to invite him for a meeting.
It was not the first time Alioum, who is the leader of one of over a dozen vigilante groups recognized by the community, would be summoned by a local leader. But this time he was called to the gold mine on the outskirts of the town.
“Because this meeting was happening in an isolated area, I smelled trouble,” Alioum told The Daily Beast.
As Alioum arrived at the mine, he says, he met three white soldiers accompanied by about a dozen soldiers from the Central African Armed Forces (FACA) standing in front of a number of local community leaders and some heads of other vigilante groups. They gave the locals an ultimatum.
“One of the white soldiers began to speak, saying we should inform everyone who lives near the mine to leave the area because it has been sold off by the government,” Alioum said. “When we asked who it was sold to, they refused to tell us.”
Despite the Russians insisting that residents had to leave the area close to the mine and threatening to forcefully evict anyone who refused to vacate the area, the locals who attended the meeting, according to Alioum, remained adamant.
“We told them at the meeting that we were not going to leave our homes because we have nowhere to go,” said Alioum. “Then they told us that we were going to regret our decision.”
No one in Koki heard from the Russians again until the following month when what witnesses describe as the first major atrocity committed by Russian paramilitaries under the new leadership took place.
An attempt by the Russians to seize the gold mine turned into a bloody massacre, according to 16 witnesses in and around Koki who spoke to The Daily Beast. They say white soldiers executed dozens of people who had been rounded up in the town, where less than 5,000 people live. The victims were mostly artisanal miners, traders and CPC rebels, many of whom live very close to the mine.
“On the first day of the attack alone, I counted 16 bodies,” a villager in Koki told The Daily Beast. “Two of them were male children.”
The attack began on Sunday, Oct. 22, just before noon. Russian paramilitaries accompanied by FACA soldiers arrived by helicopter near the Koki mine and exchanged gunfire for nearly 30 minutes with about two dozen rebels from the Coalition of Patriots for Change (CPC). Artisanal miners and local vigilantes said four CPC rebels and 12 civilians were killed that day.
“The rebels were meeting on a field, with civilians present, near the mine when a helicopter showed up and started firing at people.” Kondogbia*, an artisanal miner in Koki, told The Daily Beast. “People started to scream and fall on the ground as the shooting began. There was commotion everywhere.”
Several witnesses said white soldiers, which is what locals call the Russian paramilitaries, flew another helicopter overhead, dropping bombs and firing at people who tried to escape from the area. They said the bombing and shooting lasted for many hours.
“While the aerial strikes were taking place, another group of white soldiers and FACA officials spread themselves across the town, making sure that all the exits were blocked,” said Alioum. “Many people were trapped.”
The operation, which witnesses say involved dozens of Russian paramilitaries and a handful of FACA soldiers, lasted for five days. Survivors say scores of men were rounded up; some of them were tortured, and some were killed.
The destruction was huge. Numerous houses, especially those belonging to artisanal miners, and shops were reduced to ashes, rendering many people homeless.
“Koki was brought to its knees,” said Kondogbia, whose home was destroyed during the onslaught. “The attackers made sure everyone who worked at the mine was either killed or rendered homeless.”
When the Russian paramilitaries met with local leaders in Koki a month before the massacre, they made it clear where the orders came from. “During the meeting, one of them said, ‘We are doing what our new bosses told us to do,’” said Alioum.
These new bosses have come in to fill the void left by Wagner Group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin who was reportedly killed in a plane crash in Tver Oblast, north of Moscow, on Aug. 23. The Russian Ministry of Defense has stepped in to oversee the operations of Russian mercenaries across CAR who were previously under Prigozhin and Wagner’s command, a number of well-placed senior government officials in the Central African nation told The Daily Beast.
In Markounda, a town located just…
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