France is to hold a meeting of its top defense committee Friday on the Central African Republic and later host Chad's President Idriss Deby, the French presidency said.

The meeting of the limited defense committee -- which includes President Francois Hollande and top ministers -- is to take place at 1000 GMT and Hollande will then hold talks with Deby, who has a powerful influence over events in the CAR, in Paris at 1700 GMT.

The race is on to find hundreds of troops for the EU's military mission in the troubled Central African Republic, the French head of the operation said Thursday.

"We are working with a sense of urgency," said General Philippe Ponties who took up his post as the mission chief for the force earlier this week.

The new president of the restive Central African Republic, Catherine Samba Panza, said Wednesday she wants to "go to war" against self-defense militias known as anti-balaka, for their lynchings and violence especially targeting Muslim civilians.

"We are going to go to war against the anti-balaka," she said in the town of Mbaiki, south of the capital Bangui, during a visit by French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, whose country has deployed troops to Central Africa to quell sectarian bloodshed.

The U.N. food agency on Wednesday launched one of its largest-ever emergency food airlifts, flying in supplies to the Central African Republic.

The World Food Program's first cargo aircraft, loaded with 80 tons of rice, landed in the capital Bangui in the early afternoon, WFP spokesman Alexis Masciarelli told AFP.

"Ethnic cleansing" is being carried out against Muslim civilians in the Central African Republic, with international peacekeepers unable to prevent it, Amnesty International said on Wednesday.

France's defense minister earlier called on international forces deployed in the Christian-majority country to put an end to attacks by the militias "by force if needed".

French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian on Tuesday called on the international forces deployed in the restive Central African Republic to put an end to brutal attacks by the country's militias, "by force if needed".

"All militias, who continue to be involved in mob violence and commit murder, must stop," Le Drian said during a visit to Brazzaville in neighboring Congo.

U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon spoke Monday with French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius on increasing the number of European and African troops in the Central African Republic, the U.N. said.

Ban "asked what could be done to increase support to MISCA, to accelerate the deployment of the European Union troops, and whether additional troops might be envisaged," U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky said.

The commander of French troops in the Central African Republic on Monday accused a militia known as the anti-balaka of being the country's "main enemy of peace" to be treated as outlaws and thugs.

The mainly Christian vigilantes have been accused of brutal attacks against Muslims after the ouster of president Francois Bozize in March 2013 by mainly Muslim rebels led by Michel Djotodia, who was himself forced out last month after failing to end the sectarian violence.

A weekend of violence and looting in Bangui has left at least 10 people dead, witnesses and a humanitarian official told AFP on Sunday, including two more gruesome lynchings of minority Muslims.

Fighting broke out Saturday evening between Christian vigilantes and Muslims in the west of the Central African capital where many buildings were torched, they said.

International Criminal Court prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said Friday she has opened an initial probe into "serious crimes" committed in the Central African Republic, the scene of spiraling sectarian violence.

"My office has reviewed many reports detailing acts of extreme brutality... and allegations of serious crimes being committed. I have therefore decided to open a preliminary investigation into this... situation," she said in a statement in The Hague.