Little remained of Kibeho today beyond a lifeless trail of belongings. Most of the dead had been buried, the wounded moved out, the orphans taken away and the first aid center pulled down. The smell of dirt, excrement and death permeated the air.
About 500 ethnic Hutu were still holed up in a brick compound here, the survivors of the mass panic and shooting by Government troops on Saturday that left an estimated 2,000 dead -- shot, hacked by machetes and trampled -- and hundreds wounded, the United Nations said.
The Rwandan Government issued another ultimatum for this evening, demanding that the Hutu leave the compound building or be forcibly taken out. But United Nations officials said the Rwandan Army troops had promised that they would not open fire on the crowd.
Hundreds of Hutu left during the day, venturing on foot along the dirt road toward the town of Butare.
In Kigali, the Rwanda capital, diplomats, United Nations officials and Rwandan Government and military officials spent the day in a series of talks that touched on the damage caused to efforts at reconciliation between Hutu and Tutsi.
