Guinea leader attacks France over Kouchner comments

CONAKRY (Reuters) - The head of Guinea's ruling military junta attacked former colonial power France on Tuesday for saying it could no longer deal with him following last week's bloody crackdown on protesters.

"Guinea is not a district of France. When the French foreign minister says something like that, this is a way of denigrating the people of Africa," Captain Moussa Dadis Camara told news broadcaster France24.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said on Sunday France could no longer work with the firebrand former soldier, and called for international intervention to quell the rising tension in the world's biggest bauxite supplier.

Kouchner's comments came amid a wave of international condemnation of Camara for a lethal crackdown on protesters on September 28 that a local human rights group said killed 157 people and injured hundreds more.

The U.S. State Department on Tuesday said it conveyed "deep outrage" to the government of Guinea for the incident, in which Camara's troops opened fire on a rally in a stadium in the capital Conakry.

Camara, who seized power in the wake of a coup last December, has raised the hackles of his opponents by refusing to opt out of presidential elections set for January.

The African Union has given Camara until mid-October to confirm that he will stay clear of the January 31 elections, warning of sanctions if he misses the deadline.

The soldier-turned leader, who received military training in Germany and wears a German paratrooper badge on his trademark red beret, has denied responsibility for the bloodshed and said he is being pressured by the Guinean army to keep a grip on the presidency.

MEDIATION TALKS

The crisis in Guinea triggered mediation talks Monday led by Burkina Faso President Blaise Campaore, though the main opposition group on Tuesday said it would not participate in further discussions with the junta unless Camara steps down and dissolves his government.

After Monday's talks, Campaore had asked both sides to continue meetings in Burkina Faso's capital.

"We said we cannot go to Ouagadougou for discussions with the junta as the prerequisites are not met," Mouctar Diallo, leader of one of the main opposition groups, told Reuters.

In neighbouring Liberia, the government said on Tuesday it had launched an investigation into reports that former Liberian paramilitary fighters were involved in the shootings in Conakry.

"We have said over the past that Liberia's territory will not be used by any group or people to cause any harm in any part of this region," Liberia's information minister told Reuters.

"If we investigate and find out that indeed some Liberian ex-fighters are there, they will bear the consequences of it."

A Guinean opposition leader said last week that some of the soldiers who fired at protesters in a Conakry football stadium were from the former United Liberation Movement, a disbanded Liberian faction.

Rio Tinto, a top miner of aluminium ore bauxite in Guinea, said last week that operations were unaffected by the flare up in tensions.