The Chadian army intervened in the affairs of the neighbouring Central African Republic (CAR) in December, when a CAR rebel group known as the Convention des patriotes pour la justice et la paix, attacked the town of Birao in the far north-east of the country, near the border with Chad. Birao has been the scene of several similar attacks in the past, which caused people caught up in the crossfire to flee, sometimes into Chad. The Chadian army assisted the CAR government troops in repelling the rebel takeover of the town on the grounds that rebels fighting against the Chadian government were also based there. The claim is plausible: the rump of Chad's rebels are known to operate in the little-policed land around the borders of the CAR, Sudan and Chad. However, it may be that the CAR government claimed that Chadian rebels were involved in the Birao assault in order to draw in Chad's armed forces on its side. Whatever the truth about the alleged involvement of Chadian rebels, the co-operation between the two countries' armed forces should strengthen bilateral ties.