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UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs |
COTE D'IVOIRE: Pro-Gbagbo militants threaten fresh march on rebel capital
ABIDJAN, 3 December 2003 (IRIN) - Militia-style youth groups supporting President Laurent Gbagbo demonstrated in front of the French military base in Abidjan for the third day running on Wednesday. They also announced plans for a second attempt to march through the lines of French peacekeepers to attack the rebel stronghold of Bouake in central Cote d'Ivoire.
Police said about 700 members of the "Young Patriots" movement demonstrated outside the French base near Abidjan airport to demand the withdrawal of a 4,000-strong French peacekeeping force which controls the demilitarised buffer zone between the government-held south and the rebel-controlled north of Cote d'Ivoire.
Gbagbo said in an interview with the French newspaper Le Figaro, published on Tuesday, that the peacekeepers, who have successfully managed to enforce an eight-month ceasefire between government and rebel forces, should remain in place.
And on Tuesday night the president gave lukewarm support to his three top military commanders, who had offered to resign after unidentified soldiers interrupted state radio and television broadcasts to complain that they were taking too soft a line against the rebels and should be removed.
The dissident soldiers made the impromptu broadcast on Sunday night shortly after French troops exchanged fire with Ivorian soldiers who were escorting about 200 Young Patriots in an attempt to march across the frontline to occupy Bouake.
Defence Minister Rene Amani said in a televised statement on Tuesday night that General Mathias Doue, the military chief of staff, General Denis Bombet, the head of the army, and General Gregoire Touvoly, the head of the paramilitary gendarmerie, had submitted letters of resignation to the president following Sunday's incidents.
But Amani said that Gbagbo, for the sake of achieving "a swift and happy outcome" to the crisis in Cote d'Ivoire, had asked them to stay on.
"In the present situation, reason dictates that it is better to maintain unity in the army than to provoke a split in its ranks," he added.
Gbagbo avoided commenting on the status of the three military commanders in his interview with Le Figaro. But the president used the opportunity to express sympathy with the men who had tried unsuccessfully to march through the French lines.
"Basically you cannot blame them," he said.
In his television broadcast, Amani reminded Ivorians that the government had banned all public demonstrations for three months in October to avoid trouble in the streets.
But Charles Ble Goude, a Young Patriot leader who is close to Gbagbo and enjoys a police bodyguard, still brought out his supporters to continue their demonstrations at the French base in Abidjan on Wednesday. They were dispersed by riot police lobbing tear gas canisters at one stage, but subsequently regrouped.
Ble Goude also announced plans for a fresh attempt by the Young Patriots to march on Bouake on Friday.
On Thursday, representatives of the government, the army, French and West African peacekeepers and the rebels were due to discuss plans for disarmament in Yamoussoukro, the official capital of Cote d'Ivoire, 266 km north of Abidjan.
However, rebel spokesman Alain Logoognon made clear that the rebels, who withdrew from a broad-based government of national reconciliation in September, would not be attending the meeting.
"If those who should be guaranteeing our protection in Abidjan are themselves coming under attack, how do you expect us to return to the government?", he told IRIN by telephone from Bouake.
On Wednesday, the rebels, who are officially known as "The New Forces," were holding talks with the UN-led international monitoring committee set up to supervise the implementation of a French-brokered peace accord signed in January.
On Tuesday night, the monitoring committee expressed "profound bitterness" that a month of high-level diplomacy by West African leaders to coax the rebels back into government had been undermined by Sunday's attempt by a group of 200 Young Patriots, backed by 100 government soldiers, to cross the demilitarised buffer zone along the frontline.
"The Monitoring Committee reiterates its conviction that war will lead nowhere and that the only positive way forward is (adherence to the peace) agreement, which everyone has subscribed to," it added.
French schools in Abidjan were closed on Wednesday as a precaution against possible attacks on French residents and other European residents in the city.
Themes: (IRIN) Conflict
[ENDS]
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