13 April Associated press - Chad's President Now Facing Insurgency.

Chad's president, Idriss Deby, was embraced as a unifier when he seized power by force in 1990.

Now some of the former military pilot's own relatives have turned on him in a scramble for power heightened by the discovery of oil in a central African country with few other resources and a history of instability.

Deby, a celebrated military strategist, has played a key role in that volatile history. The rebels he now faces are even emulating him. They have used the Darfur region of neighboring Sudan as a staging ground, just as he did 16 years ago. In an attack Thursday on the capital - which Deby's forces repulsed - the rebels raced in light trucks, a tactic Deby has deployed....

The competition for power in Chad has become more intense since the country began exporting oil in 2004.

Sudan's interest in cutting off Chadian support for Darfurian rebels and the Chadian rebels' desire for power appear to have combined to place Deby at serious risk.