The Burundi peace talks due to take place in Tanzania on Thursday will not go ahead as planned because of the latest upsurge of fighting in Burundi.

Burundi conflict

Population: 6 million (1997) Hutu (85%) Tutsi (14%) Twa (1%) 200,000 killed since 1993 President: Pierre Buyoya (Tutsi) since 1996 coup Buyoya due to hand over to Hutu next year

The Burundi Government delegation has not left Bujumbura for Dar es Salaam as planned, says the BBC's Prime Ndikumagenge in the capital.

President Pierre Buyoya's administration felt that the recent escalation in the fighting between the government forces and Hutu rebels was so serious that the peace talks were not possible, he said.

The Hutu rebel groups had already said they would not attend the talks.

Tanzania accused

The Burundi army says it has killed over 200 rebels in fighting in the last two weeks.

Most of the rebels were killed at Gitega, 100 km (60 miles) east of Bujumbura, where 152 died, according to a military spokesman.

The army says rebels of the Forces for the Defence of Democracy (FDD), who have launched attacks in a number of areas of the country over the past few weeks, entered Burundi from Tanzania.

Army spokesman Colonel Augustin Nzabampena accused Tanzania of "hosting the rebels" - this was "an obvious fact that any person can check on the ground".

Burundi's Foreign Minister, Therence Sinunguruza, went further and said that his government had proof that that the incursions into Burundi "were carried out with the complicity of the Tanzanian local authorities".

The minister told the French news agency, AFP, that the Burundi government would call on the Tanzanian government to punish border officials for allowing rebels to cross into Burundi.

Constitutional row

The Burundian Government is also under fire on the political front.

Five parties representing the Tutsi minority have threatened to pull out of the coalition within 20 days, accusing the government of violating the Arusha agreement establishing it.

The coordinator for the parties, Joseph Nzeyimana, told the BBC that the government had violated the accord by proceeding with the drafting of the constitution without involving the Tutsi parties.

They had only talked to the parties the day before the constitution was to be presented to parliament.

Hopes were high last year

In a further violation of the agreement, President Buyoya has failed to accord equal status to the Tutsi parties in distributing posts in the government and the diplomatic service, Mr Nzeyimana said.

The Tutsi politician said that even though work on a new constitution had begun before they became part of the coalition, the Tutsi parties had joined "to show to the international community and the national community that the first thing we had to give was to demonstrate that we were for peace".

He said the Tutsi parties had been in the government for 10 months and no constitutional changes had been made, which was "wrong".

The Tutsi parties have emphasised that if President Buyoya fails to respond positively to their grievances within 20 days, they will leave the government.