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Foreign ambassadors in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) were rescued by U.N. and European peacekeepers from the residence of opposition presidential candidate Jean-Pierre Bemba on Aug. 21 after they were trapped in an exchange of gunfire between Bemba's private security detail and members of the presidential guard. The firefight broke out at around 3 p.m. local time while several foreign envoys, reportedly including the U.S., British and U.N. ambassadors, were meeting with Bemba to impress upon him the need to respect the country's national electoral process. The Aug. 21 meeting followed national elections in which no candidate won an outright majority (incumbent President Joseph Kabila won 44 percent of the vote while Bemba came in second with 20 percent), forcing a runoff scheduled for Oct. 29.
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