Rebels Attack Ivory Coast from Liberia

It appears that a new conflict has erupted in Ivory Coast, most likely rebel mercenaries in the employ of former President Laurent Gbagbo, who was forcibly removed from office this year after he lost the election and refused to leave.

We are concerned that this is just the begging, unless ECOWAS or someone else begins to patrol that border. What is clear is that a new rebel force is being hired, trained, and armed inside Liberia in a remote area, an area very difficult to monitor. Watch to see who is bringing in the arms and by what means.

-Shimron Issachar

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At least 15 people have been killed in an attack on the Ivory Coast's armed forces in the country's southwest, according to state television.

The state-run RTI network said on Saturday the attack happened overnight on Thursday and it appeared the assailants had come across the Liberian border into the Tai region of Ivory Coast.

The attack caught the soldiers by surprise, RTI reported

"Members of the FRCI [Republican Forces of Ivory Coast] were attacked by surprise. The toll from the attack was 15 dead," RTI said, adding that reinforcements were being sent to the porous and densely forested border region.

Leon Alla Kouakou, the Ivorian military spokesman, confirmed there had been an attack in Tai, but did not provide details.

In July, West African leaders urged the United Nations and ECOWAS, the regional bloc, to step up monitoring of the Liberia-Ivory Coast border after signs that mercenaries had been operating there since April.

The leaders of Guinea, Ivory Coast, Liberia, and Sierra Leone said at the time that insecurity on the
Liberia-Ivory Coast border represented a threat to the entire West African region.

• The government has said Liberian mercenaries were hired by supporters of Laurent Gbagbo, a former president, during the four-month post-election conflict which ended with his capture and arrest in April.

The FRCI was the name given to forces that battled to remove Gbagbo and allow Alassane Ouattara, the current president of the Ivory Coast, to assume power after winning last November's presidential election.

Gbagbo disputed the election result, sparking the conflict.

The Rests @ Al Jazira

Liberians Fighting as Mercenaries for Deposed Ivory Coast Leader

ABIDJAN - Dozens of bodies littered the streets of an Abidjan neighbourhood on Tuesday as fighting continued between Ivory Coast troops and the remnants of a militia loyal to deposed leader Laurent Gbagbo.

The clashes highlight the West African country’s struggle to restore security after a violent power struggle between Gbagbo and his rival Alassane Ouattara, who won a November election and is now president.

“We have seen many dead. We recovered 40 bodies over two hours, but we were forced to stop because he had no room left in our van,” said Franck Kodjo, an official at the International Committee of the Red Cross, adding at least five corpses were from Tuesday’s fighting.

The world’s largest cocoa grower nation tipped toward civil war after Gbagbo refused to cede power to Ouattara, triggering a conflict that killed thousands and displaced more than a million people and only began to ease with Gbagbo’s arrest last month.

A commander for the Ivorian army, known as the FRCI, said the remaining pro-Gbagbo fighters in the Abidjan neighbourhood of Yopougon were mostly Liberians who had crossed the border in the election dispute’s aftermath as soldiers for hire.

Efforts to disarm them have so far failed.

“We are in the process of securing the town but there are heavy weapons,” the commander said. “We’re not the ones firing them, it is those we oppose, the Liberians,” he said.

Other parts of Ivory Coast’s main city were coming back to life after the conflict, with banks reopening and street traffic slowly returning to normal.

Ivory Coast’s main industry, the cocoa sector, is poised to resume export at the end of this week of nearly a half a million tonnes of beans backed as a result of the conflict, exporters said on Tuesday.

Ouattara’s government is investigating Gbagbo and his inner circle for alleged human rights abuses during the conflict as he used his military to cling to power. Gbagbo, under house arrest in the country’s north, called this week for his supporters to allow the country to restart its economy in peace

The Rest @ Reuters

Ivory Coast: Thw Battle for Abidjan has Begun

Ivory Coast: French troops in Abidjan The situation seems to be in favor of the Ouattara camp. \ President of France, Nicolas Sarkozy, is meeting, on this Friday, April 1, with Prime Minister Francois Fillon, the foreign minister Alain Juppé and Defense minister Gerard Longuet, to be briefed and make decisions related to the situation in Ivory Coast. Fighters loyal to Alassane Ouattara took control of the cocoa-exporting port city of San Pedro, and seized the administrative capital of Yamoussoukro. Ouattara's forces appear to be consolidating their gains as they move toward the commercial capital Abidjan where the French soldiers are deployed. T

• Tanks and at least one helicopter would follow the rioters in some residential areas to prevent looting and violence, and protect vulnerable civilians over the coming days.


• The Defense Ministry and the Embassy of France have mapped the positions of both camps, and Prime Minister Soro said, on Thursday, that the forces of the Ivorian president internationally recognized are 100 kilometers northeast from Abidjan, and if Mr. Gbagbo doesn't step down, Abidjan may be under attack.

He ensured that several of Gbabo’s Generals, including his chief of staff, had defected, and will make public statements.

• There are also defections by groups in the police, the gendarmerie and the army, the Prime Minister Soro added.


• Alassane Ouattara called for the "physical integrity" of his rival to be preserved if he would step down and ovoid a bloody slaughter to the innocent citizens, Ally Coulibaly, Ambassador of Ivory Coast in France has reported.

Earlier this morning, the battle of Abidjan has begun, and the latest stronghold position of Gbabo might fall in the hands of Alassane Ouattara’s troops and the international community fears again another slaughter…

The Rest @ African Bulletin

Ivory Coast in Election Crisis

About 14,000 people have fled Ivory Coast to neighbouring Liberia following last month's disputed Ivorian presidential election, the UN says.

It says it is prepared for a total of 30,000 refugees in the region.
Most of those fleeing are supporters of Alassane Ouattara, who is recognised internationally as the new president.

Three West African presidents will go to Ivory Coast on Tuesday to personally urge incumbent leader Laurent Gbagbo to quit, Benin's foreign minister says.

Mr Gbagbo has rejected widespread calls to step down, citing vote rigging in northern areas.

'Ivorian blood'

The spokeswoman for the UN refugee agency (UNHCR), Fatoumata Lejeune-Kaba, told the BBC that most of those who had left Ivory Coast since the 28 November election had come from villages in the west of the country.

She said they had been walking for days to escape tensions they feared could explode into violence, and the flow was continuing.

A UNHCR statement added: "With their numbers growing, the humanitarian needs are increasing for the mostly women and children refugees as well as for the villagers hosting them."
Benin's Foreign Minister Jean Marie Ehouzou has said the presidents of Benin, Sierra Leone and Cape Verde will visit Ivory Coast to tell Mr Gbagbo on behalf of regional bloc Ecowas "that he must step down as quickly as possible or face legitimate military force".

Mr Gbagbo says the presidential poll was rigged in rebel areas that backed Mr Ouattara
He was echoing a warning on Friday from West African leaders of possible military action.
Mr Gbagbo's government said the threat was unjust. It also condemned a decision by the West African central bank to give control of Ivory Coast's account to Mr Ouattara.

Earlier Mr Ouattara urged the armed forces to protect civilians against attack from "the militias and foreign mercenaries that are spilling Ivorian blood".

He said perpetrators of recent violence would be prosecuted and invited investigators from the International Criminal Court to the country.

Mr Ouattara and his cabinet are based at a hotel in the main city, Abidjan, under the protection of UN troops.

• Mr Gbagbo has demanded that UN and French troops leave the country. A close ally even warned that they could be treated as rebels if they did not obey the instruction.
• The UN, which has 10,000 peacekeepers in the country, rejected the call.
  UN officials say at least 170 people have been killed in recent attacks linked to the Ivorian armed forces, who remain publicly loyal to Mr Gbagbo.
• There have been suggestions that member nations send in troops to strengthen the presence of the UN peacekeeping force.

The election was meant to unite the country after a civil war in 2002 split the world's largest cocoa producer in two, with the predominantly Muslim North supporting Mr Ouattara and the mainly Christian south backing Mr Gbagbo.

The Rest @ the BBC

UN Sanction for Ivory Coast Extended

The Ivory Coast is not at Peace

• in 2004 the UN Sanctioned the Ivory Coast becasue they violated a 2003 cease-fire between the government and the New Forces rebels
• In 2005 they added an embargo on diamonds mined in Ivory Coast

-technial evidance suggests New Forces Guerillas are still involved in Diamond and arms markets to support theri forces

-Shimron

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 29 (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council renewed arms and diamond sanctions against Ivory Coast on Monday in a bid to make the West African country stick to the terms of a peace process following a civil war.

A resolution passed unanimously by the 15-member council extended the sanctions for a further year but promised to review them during that period, in which general elections are supposed to be held in the world's biggest cocoa exporter.

Ivory Coast has made stuttering progress towards reunification since a March peace deal signed in Burkina Faso's capital Ouagadougou by President Laurent Gbagbo and rebel leader Guillaume Soro, now his prime minister.

The Security Council slapped an arms embargo on Ivory Coast in 2004 over the violation of a 2003 cease-fire between the government and the New Forces rebels who control the country's North. An embargo on buying rough diamonds mined in Ivory Coast followed in 2005.
Monday's resolution renewed the sanctions until Oct. 31, 2008.

But the council promised to review them after the peace deal is fully implemented and after free presidential and legislative elections, or in any case by April 30.

During a speech to the U.N. General Assembly last month, Gbagbo asked the council to ease the sanctions.

"We think that all the aspects of the Ouagadougou agreement have not yet been put into effect, notably on disarmament problems. So we think it's necessary to keep the pressure up," French Ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert told reporters.

"We think it's necessary to keep the pressure up so that the electoral calendar is respected."

The Rest @ Reuters Africa

Liberian authorities investigating a possible coup plot have discovered a large cache of new AK-47 ammunition in a town on the main road to Ivory Coast, police said on Monday.

Police spokesman Alvin Jask Kanneh said it was too early to say whether the cache was linked to an alleged scheme to smuggle weapons into Liberia from Ivory Coast.

A former armed forces chief and a former speaker of parliament were charged with treason last month in connection with the plot.

The ammunition cache was discovered on Sunday in the town of Gbarnga by Liberian police and a team from the United Nations peacekeeping force, which is helping the country recover from a 14-year on-off civil war that ended in 2003.
"Most of the ammunition was new. We are talking about AK-47 machine gun ammunition. Also, different types of weapons ammunitions. We cannot give you the total quantity, but (it was) large," Kanneh said.

A security source in the capital Monrovia said the ammunition was discovered in an unfinished building following a tip-off received in Monrovia.
"As of now, we have not made any arrest as the investigation is still ongoing in the place. We cannot say who are those behind this," Kanneh said.

General Charles Julu, who led a 1994 coup attempt during the civil war, and former National Assembly speaker George Koukou were charged with treason in July after the publication of a video which Liberian authorities said showed two associates of Julu discussing how to transport weapons from Ivory Coast.
Julu was arrested in mid-July for "subversive activities" which officials said may include a coup plot against the government of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, who was elected president in late 2005.

The Russian-designed Kalashnikov AK-47, the world's best-known assault-rifle, became ubiquitous during the Cold War and was a weapon of choice for tens of thousands of soldiers and children who have fought in civil wars in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Ivory Coast since the late 1980s.

Gbarnga served as a headquarters for the rebellion led by Charles Taylor, who went on to be elected president in 1997, was forced into exile in 2003 and is now on trial on war crimes charges stemming from Sierra Leone's intertwined civil war.

3 Rockets Fired at Plane Carrying Ivory Coast PM: 4 Dead

Cote d'Ivoire's Prime Minister Guillaume Soro has called for an international investigation into the rocket attack against his plane, which occurred Friday in Bouake, stronghold of the former New Forces (FN) rebels, leaving four people dead and a dozen more injured.

"I'm calling for an international investigation in order to establish the security lapses which occurred," the prime minister, who spoke Sunday on the attack for the first time, was quoted as saying by the local press Monday.
Three rockets were fired Friday morning at an airplane carrying the prime minister as it was landing at Bouake.

The Rest @ The People's Daily (China)

Blood Diamonds: an Ivory Coast Connection?

Prior to 2005, the ROC was removed form the Kimberly process for a massive discrepancy between it's diamond mining and its exports. All this was done through Lebanon.

Historically, diamonds from captured mines have been used to fund armed conflict in Africa, often by child and/or slave labor. The Kimberly process has created a process for tagging legitimate diamonds, and this process that is beginning to take effect.

This success, however, creates a need to launder blood Diamonds. Thus the Lebanon ROC blood diamond laundering process.

Around the first of June, 2007, Someone in the Ivory Coast tried to find email addresses in the Republic of Congo of several Diamond mines, and suspected diamond mine contacts.

The search appears to not come from Abidjan or any large city. They were specifically looking for Congolese diamond contacts, and they were searching in French.