The BBC, citing local media, reports that clashes at a football match in N’zérékoré, Guinea’s second-largest city, have crushed dozens of people to death.
The prime minister, Mamadou Oury Bah, announced on Monday that a stampede of people had killed several.
The government regrets the incidents that disrupted the football match between the Labé and N’zérékoré teams this afternoon in N’zérékoré. “We videotaped the victims of the stampede,” Bah wrote in a Facebook statement.
Local authorities are working to bring order back, he said.
The morgue was full, and the nearby hospital had several bodies “lined up,” an unnamed doctor told AFP.
After Labé’s supporters threw stones at the field in retaliation against the referee, police used tear gas, according to local media.
The official number of casualties is still unknown.
The referee’s disputed decision was the beginning of it all. “Then, supporters stormed the field,” a witness told AFP.
Images and videos shared on social media depicted tumultuous scenes outside the stadium, with many bodies on the ground and sizable crowds trying to scale walls.
The BBC claimed that independent verification of these videos has not been possible.
When the crush occurred, thousands of people were watching a game between Guinean teams N’zérékoré and Labé, according to local news website MediaGuinee.
According to the statement, Sunday’s game was a part of a competition commemorating President Mamadi Doumbouya, who took over in a coup in September 2021.
