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Rebels Clash With French Troops, Town Falls

UN Integrated Regional Information Networks
NEWS
January 6, 2003
Posted to the web January 6, 2003
Abidjan
French troops and rebels in western Cote d'Ivoire clashed again on Monday in
the western town of Duekoue, French army spokesman Lt-Col Ange-Antoine Lecia
told IRIN. Four members of the French contingent were wounded but Lecia could
not give casualty figures on the rebel side.
Speaking in Abidjan, Lecia also said he could not say against which armed
movement his men fought. In late November, two new groups-the Justice and Peace
Movement (MJP) and the Ivorian Popular Movement of the Great West (MPIGO)-
emerged as new fronts. For the last month, numerous skirmishes have occurred
between one of the new groups and the French soldiers.
According to Lecia, the fighting which lasted about three hours with mortars
ended around 12:30 GMT (local time).
This latest fighting has coincided with rebel incursions in southwestern Cote
d'Ivoire which have led to population displacement toward the port city of San
Pedro, humanitarian sources told IRIN on Monday. The southwestern town of
Grabo, sources said, had fallen into the hands of the rebels.
The rush towards San Pedro is a worrisome situation, sources said. In recent
days, some 2,200 people had taken refuge in the compound of a local primary
school, the head of the Red Cross in San Pedro, Akpa Emmanuel told IRIN on
Monday. He said it was difficult to assess the number of displaced as
population movement is very unpredictable. Akpa said his organisation and
others faced serious difficulties in catering for the basic needs, especially
in terms of food and medical supplies. The organisations have also been
struggling with transportation as the displaced want to leave San Pedro for the
economic capital Abidjan, or the central towns of Bocanda and Daoukro.
These events took place amid a very eventful political weekend highlighted by
the second visit of France's Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin who was in
Abidjan to push for a diplomatic solution to the crisis. On the first leg in
Abidjan on Friday, de Villepin announced that his government was ready to
receive on 15 January all the major political parties for a one-week round
table discussion. This meeting is to be followed on 26 January by a heads of
state meeting of countries affected by the crisis, de Villepin said. A second
major announcement was made by President Laurent Gbagbo who said the national
army would observe a total ceasefire on all fronts, would ground all combat
helicopters used in recent air raids, and would expulse all mercenaries. The
mercenaries were due to leave the country on Saturday.
The trip's second leg led the foreign minister to Bouake to meet members of the
Patriotic Movement of Cote d'Ivoire (MPCI) who also pledged to stop all
fighting. The MPCI has also agreed to send a delegation to Paris. Absent from
the Bouake meeting were representatives of the MJP and MPIGO.

   

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