Two young men were shot dead Monday in the suburbs of Guinea’s capital Conakry on the first day of an open-ended general strike against the ruling junta, relatives and a doctor told AFP.
The protest against the military leaders who seized power in a 2021 coup was widely followed in the West African nation, with schools, shops, markets and roads deserted in Conakry.
Sporadic clashes broke out in some outskirts.
“They killed our son, they targeted him and shot him in the neck,” Adama Keita, a relative of an 18-year-old who was caught up in clashes with security forces, told AFP.
This was confirmed by a witness and a police source, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“I saw the motionless body of this teenager, I had tears in my eyes, and I immediately left the scene so as not to be associated with this type of crime,” the police source told AFP.
Another young man died elsewhere in similar circumstances, a doctor at the hospital where he died told AFP.
The Guineematin.com news site contacted the second victim’s father who confirmed the information.
“Around 12:00 pm (the security forces) called me when I was at the construction site to tell me that they had shot my child,” the website quoted him as saying.
“When I got home, my younger brother called me back to say that he had died,” he said.
“When Mamady Doumbouya took power, he said that justice would be the compass that would guide all Guineans. Today, he is doing worse” than all the other autocratic rulers Guinea has had since independence from France, he added.
Credit: AFP
