Clashes erupt on frontline as Gbagbo flies out

Fighting erupted on the frontline in divided Cote d'Ivoire on Monday and fresh demonstrations against France took place in the commercial capital Abidjan, hours after President Laurent Gbagbo flew out on a week-long private visit to the United States. The Ivorian army said seven people were killed and at least 14 wounded in clashes between unidentified gunmen and Ivorian soldiers and French peacekeepers near the village of Maminigui in central Cote d'Ivoire early on Monday. The village lies in a demilitarized zone policed by French and UN peacekeepers. A spokesman for the 4,000-strong French peacekeeping force said a group of about 30 men coming from the north - the area controlled by rebel forces - attacked their own positions and those of Ivorian troops. Two French peacekeepers were slightly wounded in the exchange of fire, he added. A senior Ivorian army commander who asked not to be named, said Ivorian soldiers also came under attack from "uncontrolled elements, supposedly of Liberian origin," at the Ity gold mine near Zouan Hounien, 300 km further west, near the Liberian border. Meanwhile, several hundred youth supporters of Gbagbo staged a rowdy demonstration outside the French embassy in Abidjan demanding the withdrawal of French peacekeepers since they had failed to secure the disarmament of rebel forces occupying the northern half of Cote d'Ivoire. French gendarmes inside the embassy compound fired tear gas to try and disperse the rowdy protesters. A UN security source said they also threatened several UN peacekeepers who were passing by in a UN vehicle. Gbagbo himself flew out on Sunday. Abidjan newspapers reported that he would fly to the United States via Ghana and the UK. Ivorian army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Jules Yao Yao said that two civilians and Ivorian soldiers were stabbed to death in Monday's clashes in central Cote d'Ivoire. An army statement later spoke of a total of seven fatalities. “The situation is under control or about to be under control,” Yao Yao told IRIN on Monday evening. Amadou Kone, a senior aide of rebel leader Guillaume Soro, told IRIN by telephone from Bouake, the headquarters of the "New Forces" rebel movement, that rebel forces were not responsible for the attack. Sidiki Konate, the rebels' official spokesman, later told IRIN that the New Forces were checking on the situation. Cote d'Ivoire plunged into civil war in September 2002 and was supposed to have ended with a French-brokered peace agreement in January 2003. But fighting dragged on for a further three months and since then both sides have been slow to implement the increasingly fragile peace accord. A senior commander of the Armed Forces of Côte d’Ivoire (FANCI) near Maminigui, 360 km northwest of Abidjan, told IRIN that the “Ivorian army knows perfectly who attacked their positions,,” but he refused to elaborate. The attack on the gold mine near Zouan Hounien is the latest incident in a series of violent events to grip the volatile West of the country, where several ethnically inspired killings have been reported in recent weeks, banditry is on the rise and pro-Gbagbo youths recently staged a two-day sit-in outside the French military base in the town of Guiglo. However, Colonel Philippe Decussac, described it as "an isolated event.” The area is still rife with Liberian gunmen who have fought on both sides of the border, and pro-government militias. One humanitarian source described the situation in the government-controlled sector of the west as “tense and volatile.” Anti-French and anti-U.N. sentiment is running high among supporters of Gbagbo. They accuse the international community of not doing enough to confront the rebels who have refused to disarm until the president implements key political reforms and delegates effective power to a broad-based coalition government which has been on the rocks for the past two months. The rebels and the four main parliamentary opposition partners withdrew their 26 ministers from the 41-member cabinet at the end of March after the security forces used brute force to crush a banned opposition demonstration in Abidjan. A UN investigation concluded that at least 120 people were killed as police, soldiers and shadowy paramilitary groups linked to the presidency attacked civilians indiscriminately. Two weeks ago, Seydou Diarra, the independent prime minister who is regarded by diplomats as the lynchpin of the peace process, effectively went on strike after Gbagbo undermined his authority by sacking three opposition ministers, including Soro the rebel leader. Diarra said in a leaked letter to the president, that he would not convene another cabinet meeting until the political crisis had been resolved. However, Gbagbo has technically left the mild-mannered former civil servant in charge of the country in his absence. “Verbally, he was asked to take over in the interim”, a spokeswoman at Diarra’s office told IRIN. She declined to say how Diarra, who is seen by diplomats as lacking real power, responded to the instruction. According to a diplomat from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), President of Ghana John Kufuor and Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria will press the United States to become more closely involved in international efforts to resolve the crisis in Cote d'Ivoire, when they make a guest appearance at this week's G8 summit of leading world powers at Sea Island, Georgia. Gbagbo himself has not been invited to the summit. Several Ivorian newspapers said he would visit the UK for a few days and then fly to the United States to meet US business leaders once the G8 meeting was over. The president’s office remained tight-lipped. A spokesman said only that Gbagbo would undertake "a private visit to Washington DC” and would have meetings with businessmen.