A FORMER Burundian president, Mr Pierre Buyoya, seized power in a military coup yesterday, ousting the Hutu incumbent, President Sylvestre Ntibantunganya, and shattering a fragile power sharing accord between the country's rival ethnic groups.
The new regime immediately closed all borders and airports in the central African republic, which has been on the brink of civil war for three years.
Mr Buyoya (46) is a Tutsi military official who previously seized power in an army led coup in September 1987.
The Tutsi led army which masterminded the coup said Mr Ntibantunganya's flight on Tuesday to the US ambassador's residence in Bujumbura amounted to a "de facto resignation".
But the UN Secretary General, Dr Boutros Boutros Ghali, warned that the international community "will on no account accept a change of government by force or other illegitimate means in Burundi."
However, an army spokesman poured scorn on international threats. "Burundi is not going to be colonised again. This is an independent country and we are not going to be governed by foreigners", Lieut Col Longin Minani said.
He was reacting to an earlier threat of military intervention, made by the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) in the event of a coup. The OAU secretary general, Mr Salim Ahmed Salim, had warned in Addis Ababa that any coup would be met by force.
In Bujumbura, the Defence Minister, Mr Firmin Sinzoyiheba, said Mr Buyoya would head a "government of transition" to avoid a situation that could plunge Burundi into chaos "and even wipe it out as a nation".
He said the existing government had proved unable to deal with mounting social and political disorder, adding that "unspeakable acts of genocide and killings almost everywhere in the country have become commonplace".
An existing dusk to dawn curfew was retained and the national assembly, political parties and political organisations were suspended until further notice, the Defence Ministry said.
The streets of Bujumbura were calm last night. The coup did not appear to have sparked any celebrations or violence, and most people appeared willing to go to work as normal.
However, a senior UN official in New York said Hutu extremists were besieging the two main cities in Burundi, Bujumbura and central Gitega, apparently to "starve the cities into submission."