By Abdoulaye Massalatchi NIAMEY, July 21 (Reuters) - Thousands of people marched in Niger's capital Niamey on Saturday to support the government against a rebellion by Tuareg-led nomads in the desert north. The rebel Niger Movement for Justice (MNJ) has killed at least 36 soldiers and taken dozens hostage since launching a campaign in February to demand greater autonomy for the vast region around the ancient Saharan caravan town of Agadez. The government refuses to recognise the MNJ, a political movement, and rules out talks, saying they are drug traffickers and common bandits. It has threatened military action. "We are marching to demonstrate our attachment to peace, democracy and equality for all before the law," said Nouhou Arzika, leader of a group of civil society organisations which called the march. "We make a final appeal to those who remain in the MNJ to lay down their weapons, free the hostages and return to the ranks of civil society engaged in democratic combat." Arzika, whose movement has in the past organised several mass marches against the government, pledged support for the armed forces and called on President Mamadou Tandja to bolster their capacity. Opposition parties which initially called for talks with the MNJ have also thrown their weight behind the government. The light-skinned Tuaregs staged a rebellion in northern Niger in the 1990s to demand more autonomy from a black African dominated government following a clampdown by the security forces in which scores of civilians were killed. At that time their insurgency won widespread support, absorbed into a wider spirit of anti-government solidarity in which protesters from all ethnic groups in the country staged demonstrations to demand an end to single-party rule. But many in Niger's south say times have changed and are proud of their fledgling multi-party democracy. While they have some sympathy with the MNJ's goals of winning more development for the north, they see their methods as unacceptable. Most Tuareg rebel groups signed a peace deal in 1995 which promised more development for the north, strengthened local government and promised the incorporation of thousands of former fighters into the security forces. The MNJ says those pledges have not been respected but the government says more than 8,500 former fighters have been given jobs and points out the whole of the former French colony is desperately poor, not just the north.
