Lome talks suspended

A governmental delegation that had been appointed by Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo to negotiate a peaceful end to a three-month-old rebellion in Cote d'Ivoire returned to Abidjan at the weekend. In a statement on Sunday on national TV, the head of the 15-member delegation, Laurent Dona Fologo, said his team had failed to secure an agreement. He accused the rebel Mouvement Patriotique de la Cote d'Ivoire (MPCI) of reneging on agreements, not negotiating sincerely and doing everything to ensure the failure of the talks. "They came to Lome for everything but a peace accord," Fologo charged. However, he said the talks had not ended, but had just been suspended for the holiday period and that his delegation was ready to resume negotiations as soon as Gbagbo called on it to do so. The rebel delegation has also returned to the MPCI's base in Bouake, 350 km north of Abidjan. On Monday, Tuo Fozie, one of the MPCI's best-known figures, told IRIN from Bouake that his movement also stood ready to resume negotiations. "Why not? We'll go if they resume", Fozie said. He said that the MPCI and the two new armed movements in western Cote d'Ivoire, would meet on Monday afternoon in Bouake. Fozie said the meeting was in response to a request from the two groups to meet with the MPCI. He, however, denied media reports that the Ivorian Popular Movement for the Great West (MPIGO) and Justice and Peace Movement (MJP) were splinter groups of the MPCI. MPIGO last week recaptured the town of Man, beating back loyalist forces which had occupied the town since last month. The group clashed over the weekend with French troops deployed to enforce a 17 October ceasefire and protect French and other foreign nationals in Cote d'Ivoire. According to Radio France International, six rebels and no French soldiers were killed. The information was not confirmed independently. France' army chief of staff Gen Henri Bentegeat, who conducted a weekend mission in Abidjan, said his troops had acted in self-defence, while France's secretary of state of foreign affairs, Renaud Muselier, said French soldiers would not allow themselves to be shot at without retaliating. Asked how long the MPCI would carry on the rebellion, Fozie said the insurgents did not want a long drawn-out rebellion that lasted years. On Friday, the UN Security Council called on the belligerents to seek peaceful means to resolve the crisis. In a statement, the Council condemned "attempts to use force to influence the political situation in Cote d'Ivoire and to overthrow the elected government", expressed support for efforts by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and thanked the French government for the troops deployed so far. It also expressed its "deepest concern at reports of mass killings and serious violations of human rights in Cote d'Ivoire". In that regard, a four-member delegation from the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights was expected in the country to conduct a one-week fact-finding mission.