AFRICA/IVORY COAST - Rumours of war. “No one here has disarmed, indeed, all have rearmed and if war resumes it will be a blood bath” local sources told Fides

Friday, 29 October 2004

Abidjan (Fides Service) - Tensions grows in Ivory Caost since the New Forces rebels accused the President, Laurent Gbagbo, of wanting to take rebel controlled areas with force.
At a press conference in Bouake, the main city in central northern Ivory Coast in the hands of the rebellion since 2002, one of the rebel leaders Guillaume Soro said his troops were pulling out of the disarmament process because “war will soon start again”. The New Forces have put their zone under curfew. Soro also asked 8 Opposition ministers to resign from their posts in the interim government definitively.
Political repercussions were immediate. A meeting of the Council of Ministers to examine amendments to the Constitution still to be approved by Parliament set for today, 29 October, was postponed indefinitely.
Tension in Ivory Coast rose after rebels confiscated two truckloads of arms which they claimed were for presidential militia infiltrated in rebel territory for some time (see Fides 28 October 2004). The New Forces leaders say President Gbagbo is conniving with Ibrahim Coulibaly (IB) a former member of the rebellion detained in prison in France. Both men deny the charges as a “grotesque invention”.
“But war is, sad to say, a real, concrete possibility” local sources in Abidjan told Fides. “The disarmament process never really got started, indeed the contrary if anything. In these two years of stalemate the sides have rearmed. In my opinion, if civil war resumes, it will be a blood bath”.
Tension is also growing in the government controlled part of the country. In Abidjan on Wednesday 27 October loyal supporters of the President headed a campaign to destroy newspapers considered close to the Opposition. Groups of youngsters made newspaper stands and street vendors hand over all the copies of newspaper which “support the rebellion”.
Since the civil war in 2002 and notwithstanding peace agreement signed in January 2003, Ivory Coast is still divided with the north and west in the hands of groups of rebels under the banner of New Forces. In the country there are various groups of peacekeepers: 6,000 from the United Nations, 12,000 Africans sent by the West African Economic Community and 4,000 French troops. (L.M.) (Agenzia Fides 29/10/2004 righe 37 parole 457)


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