(SomaliNet) Burundian army spokesperson said Friday that the army will investigate allegations that its troops executed 13 holdout rebels who were training in a village outside the capital, AP reported. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Colonel Manirakiza said the Burundian army killed 13 rebels who were training in Bujumbura Rural province on Thursday, adding one soldier also was killed in the operation. In retaliation to the act, mayor Desire Ngendakumana suggested that the suspected rebels were executed in cold blood. He said all had gunshot wounds to the head. "There was not a fighting, but it is clear all of them were executed," Ngendakumana, mayor of the Isare area where the incident occurred, told the independent African Public Radio.
"An investigation will be opened very soon to establish exactly what happened and how it happened," Manirakiza said. The killings occurred after peace talks between the rebel group and Burundi's government stalled in neighbouring Tanzania. More than 250,000 people have lost their lives in the 12-year conflict and most of theses died of disease and hunger. The war started in October 1993, when Tutsi paratroopers assassinated the country's first democratically elected president, a Hutu.