LAURENT GBAGBO was on the verge of leaving power in Ivory Coast last night after a heavy assault by forces loyal to his presidential rival Alassane Ouattara, supported by UN and French helicopter strikes.
French foreign minister Alain Juppé said negotiations were taking place for Mr Gbagbo’s surrender, with the international community pushing him to sign a document handing over power and recognising Mr Ouattara as president. The United Nations mission in Ivory Coast said Mr Gbagbo was in a bunker at his residence in Abidjan, the largest city, with the building surrounded by forces loyal to his rival.
Mr Gbagbo has resisted international pressure to step down since losing an election to Mr Ouattara last November, but a new offensive by forces aligned to the president-elect over the past week has overwhelmed his army.
French president Nicolas Sarkozy urged Mr Ouattara in a telephone call to form a national unity government as soon as possible, Mr Juppé said.
The outgoing president’s forces called for a ceasefire after being comprehensively outgunned in what Mr Ouattara’s forces called a “final assault” on Abidjan.
Mr Gbagbo’s spokesman confirmed negotiations were taking place last night and said they covered security guarantees for Mr Gbagbo and his relatives.
US president Barack Obama called on Mr Gbagbo to stand down immediately and order his fighters to lay down their arms.
In a statement, Mr Obama said he strongly supported the role of the UN peacekeeping force and French troops who were protecting civilians.
“All parties must show restraint and respect for the rights of the Ivorian people,” he added.
While his forces had put up strong resistance in Abidjan, where he won 55 per cent of the vote in last November’s election, the tide turned against Mr Gbagbo on Monday night, when his rival’s new assault coincided with a decision by the UN mission to intervene to protect civilians.
The peacekeeping force, supported by the French military, targeted Mr Gbagbo’s heavy weapons with attack helicopters, invoking a UN Security Council resolution adopted last month.
“The war is over,” Alcide Djedje, Mr Gbagbo’s foreign minister, told French television. “When the heavy artillery and the ammunitions depots have been destroyed, the security forces can’t continue to fight very long.”
A UN spokesman said senior pro-Gbagbo generals had told the peacekeeping force they would stop fighting and wanted the organisation’s protection.
More than 1,500 people are reported to have died in the standoff over the past four months, though the real death toll is likely to be higher. The International Committee of the Red Cross says 800 people were killed in a single town in western Ivory Coast last week. As a tense calm was restored in Abidjan last night, however, aid agencies warned of a grave humanitarian situation.
The International Organisation for Migration said it had deployed staff in the western Ivorian town of Duékoué to help register and assist up to 25,000 people who had sought refuge in and around a Catholic mission in the town and who were in dire need of food, water, shelter, medical and sanitation assistance.
Médecins Sans Frontières said its medical team in Abidjan had been trapped at the Abobo Sud Hospital since March 31st due to the “extremely dangerous conditions”, severely restricting its ability to treat the sick and wounded.
PORTRAIT OF PRESIDENTIAL RIVALS
LAURENT GBAGBO:
* After coming to power in 2000, Gbagbo’s mandate expired in 2005, but the presidential election was delayed until 2010 because of instability in the west African country.
* He rose to prominence as a Marxist firebrand lecturer who challenged the autocratic rule of Felix Houphouet-Boigny, Ivory Coast’s first post-independence president. That got him imprisoned in a military camp for two years in 1971.
* Since then he emerged as a nationalist. His supporters have been accused of xenophobic rhetoric towards mostly Muslim migrants from neighbouring Burkina Faso and Mali, sentiments largely behind the 2002-03 civil war.
* He is a Sorbonne-educated history professor but prides himself on being in touch with ordinary Ivorians, frequently bursting into the local street slang version of French.
* He put Ivory Coast on a collision course with its former colonial master in 2004, when the Ivorian military killed nine French peacekeepers in a bombing. France retaliated by destroying the Ivorian air force. His supporters attacked French expatriates, forcing 8,000 to be evacuated.
* He pledged to double cocoa production from 1.2 million tonnes a year. His government planned to overhaul the cocoa sector in line with debt relief conditions from the IMF and World Bank.
ALASSANE OUATTARA:
* A former prime minister under the country’s first post- independence president Houphouet-Boigny, Ouattara gained a reputation for good economic management and later joined the IMF, rising to deputy head.
* He is from the mainly Muslim north of Ivory Coast and was excluded from running for alleged Burkinabe origins in the 2000 poll after coup leader Robert Guei tightened rules to bar anyone whose parents were not both Ivorian.
* In the past, Gbagbo has not shied away from insinuating that Ouattara is Burkinabe and has no right to office. Because of ties with France, he has been painted as a French stooge.
* His election pledges included reforming the cocoa sector to give half the international price to farmers, broadly in line with Gbagbo’s plans. He pledged to overhaul healthcare and education with a big programme of rural clinic and school building. – (Reuters)