Four killed in Côte d’Ivoire, UN condemns increasing violence

[News_Editor]

Four killed in Côte d’Ivoire, UN condemns increasing violence

2011-03-17 00:12:29 GMT+7 (ICT)

ABIDJAN, COTE D'IVOIRE (BNO NEWS) -- Four people were killed on Wednesday by unidentified gunmen in the main city of Abidjan in Côte d’Ivoire, raising fears of a return to civil war.

According to the BBC, witnesses said attackers arrived in a taxi at a roadblock in the Cocody suburb and opened fire.

The United Nations peacekeeping mission in the country, known as UNOCI, reported that 18 people, including three women and a baby, were wounded last night by a grenade thrown by unidentified individuals in the southern town of Attecoubé in Abidjan district.

The city has seen heavy fighting between supporters of disputed President Laurent Gbagbo and those of his rival, Alassane Ouattara. UNOCI condemned the increasing violence and called for an immediate end to the strife that is hampering efforts to resolve the ongoing political crisis.

"UNOCI considers it imperative to put an end, immediately, to this escalation of violence that jeopardizes peace, social cohesion and national reconciliation," the mission said in a news release.

More than 400 people have died in the violent crisis stemming from the December 2010 presidential elections which were meant to be the culminating point in reunifying a country split by civil war in 2002 into a Government-controlled south and a rebel-held north. Some 370,000 people have been internally displaced and over 70,000 more have fled to neighboring Liberia due to violence.

Gbagbo recently demanded the withdrawal of UNOCI, which has been supporting the stabilization efforts over the past seven years. The UN Security Council rejected the demand and instead authorized the immediate deployment of 2,000 additional troops and three armed helicopters. UNOCI currently has approximately 10,000 troops in the African country.

On Tuesday, a new Human Rights Watch investigation in Abidjan said that organized violence by Gbagbo's forces may amount to crimes against humanity.

"The time is long overdue for the UN Security Council to impose sanctions against Gbagbo and his allies directly implicated in the grave abuses of the post-election period," said Daniel Bekele, Africa director at Human Rights Watch.

"The international community should also send a clear message to Ouattara's camp that reprisal killings will place them next on the list," he added.

On March 14, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, echoed the call of several member states on the Human Rights Council to establish a Commission of Inquiry that would investigate grave violations of human rights during the post-election period.

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