Army bombs rebels in eastern Chad, aid workers flee

N'DJAMENA, Jan 24 (Reuters) Chad's air force bombed rebel positions on the eastern border with Sudan, killing at least two insurgents, as violence forced foreign aid workers to leave a refugee camp further north today.

Chadian rebels of the Union of Forces for Democracy and Development (UFDD), a coalition grouping several warring factions, said a government helicopter pounded their positions in the border town of Ade yesterday.

''Just before the helicopter bombed us, French planes passed overhead. I think there were Mirage planes,'' UFDD leader Mahamat Nouri told Reuters. ''They marked our positions and then the helicopter came.'' He said two people were killed and four were injured in the attack. French planes had flown over their positions again on Wednesday but there had been no further bombings, he said.

France has signed a military cooperation agreement with Chadian President Idriss Deby's government, under which it provides intelligence and logistical support.

French armed forces spokesman Christophe Prazuck said its troops had remained firmly within this mandate and had not bombed anything in Chad.

Chadian military sources claimed its aircraft had been bombing the rebels since Monday, killing 20 of their fighters and wounding 30 more, including a senior commander.

''These bombings will continue until we drive out all the rebels between Amdjarame and Goz Beida, in eastern Chad,'' said a military source.

Some 200 km further north, foreign aid workers evacuated the Kounoungou refugee camp near the town of Guereda after a military policeman and a rebel fighter were killed in gun battle, UN officials said.

''There was a violent incident,'' said an official with the UN refugee agency UNHCR. ''We have asked our staff to leave the camp until we know more.'' A group of observers from the African Union who were inspecting the camp were evacuated by helicopter to major eastern town of Abeche, said another UN source.

He said the rebel killed was a member of the United Front for Democratic Change (FUC), whose leader Mahamat Nour Abdelkerim held a reconciliation meeting with Deby last month in Guereda.

It was not clear whether the firefight was an official action by the FUC, which has splintered into many separate factions since launching a lightning attack on N'Djamena in April that was defeated at the cost of hundreds of lives.

Several rebel groups have been fighting a cat-and-mouse conflict with Chadian government forces in eastern Chad, demanding an end to Deby's 17-year rule in the landlocked central African oil producer.

A senior US diplomat last week denounced ''a quiet war'' between Chad and neighbouring Sudan, with both governments supporting rebels in each others' territory. Khartoum and N'Djamena deny this.

REUTERS SI MIR RAI2205