seruriermarshal
06-10-2004, 10:23 PM
Ivory Coast Asks French to Leave
Agence France-Presse
June 10,2004
ABIDJAN, June 10 (AFP) - Anti-French vitriol rocked the Ivory Coast main city Abidjan again Thursday as hundreds of young government supporters clogged the entrance to the French military base in a peaceful demonstration.
The 4,000 French troops patrolling their former colony since last year have worn out their welcome, firebrand "Young Patriots" leader Charles Ble Goude said.
He and other hardline partisans of President Laurent Gbagbo have repeatedly accused France of betraying the country with its perceived support for rebels whose failed coup bid in September 2002 plunged the west African state into war.
The "Patriots" also demanded that UN peacekeepers who have been in Ivory Coast since April stay home until Gbagbo returns Wednesday from a private trip to the United States.
Tight security nearly matched one security officer to each of the 300 or so demonstrators to thwart violence from erupting outside the military base as it has in past protests by the hardliners.
A wave of anti-French violence washed over Abidjan earlier this week in the aftermath of tit-for-tat breaches of the confidence zone stretching 400 kilometers (250 miles) across Ivory Coast, the world's top cocoa producer.
The Ivorian armed forces targeted a rebel convoy with an air strike in retaliation for an incursion into the confidence zone that has been blamed on "renegade elements" of the rebel forces who were trying to steal weapons from a military post operated jointly by French, Ivorian and UN troops.
Ble Goude, the self-proclaimed "Youth General," demanded a full accounting of the incident in the farming village of Gohitafla tucked into the confidence zone that left 22 dead including five Ivorian soldiers.
More than 100 black clad Gbagbo supporters pelted the French embassy with stones and set alight pyres of tires and wooden stakes in response to the rebel strike in Gohitafla.
Angry youth mobs clogged traffic, pulling Westerners from their vehicles, leaving an untold number of broken windshields and damaged automobiles in their wake.
Both the Ivorian military and government have denounced the acts of vandalism and moved to bring young militants to heel.
So far, however, there has been no response from Gbagbo, who departed Abidjan on Sunday vowing that upon his return, "we will take care of (the rebels)."
Once a beacon of stability and economic prosperity for a restive and impoverished region, Ivory Coast has been flattened by 20 months of political and military conflict spawned by the rebel uprising.
In a report released last week, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan warned that the one-time regional powerhouse was at a crossroads, its future dependant on whether political leaders "will rise above their personal ambitions and interests and give priority to the national interest."
lg/nb/nb
ICoast-unrest-France
COPYRIGHT 2004 Agence France-Presse. All rights reserved.
From (http://www1.africana.com/newswire/homepage_article.asp?ID=454)
Agence France-Presse
June 10,2004
ABIDJAN, June 10 (AFP) - Anti-French vitriol rocked the Ivory Coast main city Abidjan again Thursday as hundreds of young government supporters clogged the entrance to the French military base in a peaceful demonstration.
The 4,000 French troops patrolling their former colony since last year have worn out their welcome, firebrand "Young Patriots" leader Charles Ble Goude said.
He and other hardline partisans of President Laurent Gbagbo have repeatedly accused France of betraying the country with its perceived support for rebels whose failed coup bid in September 2002 plunged the west African state into war.
The "Patriots" also demanded that UN peacekeepers who have been in Ivory Coast since April stay home until Gbagbo returns Wednesday from a private trip to the United States.
Tight security nearly matched one security officer to each of the 300 or so demonstrators to thwart violence from erupting outside the military base as it has in past protests by the hardliners.
A wave of anti-French violence washed over Abidjan earlier this week in the aftermath of tit-for-tat breaches of the confidence zone stretching 400 kilometers (250 miles) across Ivory Coast, the world's top cocoa producer.
The Ivorian armed forces targeted a rebel convoy with an air strike in retaliation for an incursion into the confidence zone that has been blamed on "renegade elements" of the rebel forces who were trying to steal weapons from a military post operated jointly by French, Ivorian and UN troops.
Ble Goude, the self-proclaimed "Youth General," demanded a full accounting of the incident in the farming village of Gohitafla tucked into the confidence zone that left 22 dead including five Ivorian soldiers.
More than 100 black clad Gbagbo supporters pelted the French embassy with stones and set alight pyres of tires and wooden stakes in response to the rebel strike in Gohitafla.
Angry youth mobs clogged traffic, pulling Westerners from their vehicles, leaving an untold number of broken windshields and damaged automobiles in their wake.
Both the Ivorian military and government have denounced the acts of vandalism and moved to bring young militants to heel.
So far, however, there has been no response from Gbagbo, who departed Abidjan on Sunday vowing that upon his return, "we will take care of (the rebels)."
Once a beacon of stability and economic prosperity for a restive and impoverished region, Ivory Coast has been flattened by 20 months of political and military conflict spawned by the rebel uprising.
In a report released last week, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan warned that the one-time regional powerhouse was at a crossroads, its future dependant on whether political leaders "will rise above their personal ambitions and interests and give priority to the national interest."
lg/nb/nb
ICoast-unrest-France
COPYRIGHT 2004 Agence France-Presse. All rights reserved.
From (http://www1.africana.com/newswire/homepage_article.asp?ID=454)