Ivory Coast's Gbagbo snubs African Union mediation talks
Mauritanian residents, who fled fighting in some districts of Abidjan, wait next to their luggage inside the compound of the Mauritanian embassy in Abidjan, where they took refuge, to be evacuated to their country on March 7, 2011. Three people were killed overnight in a "rebel" attack in an Abidjan district controlled by forces loyal to Ivory Coast's internationally recognized president, the government of incumbent president Laurent Gbagbo said Monday.
Photograph by: Issouf Sanogo, AFP/Getty Images
ABIDJAN, Ma - Ivory Coast strongman Laurent Gbagbo will skip African Union-hosted talks with his rival for the presidency, his party said Tuesday in a new snub to efforts to end an increasingly bloody dispute.
Gbagbo would not attend Thursday's talks with Alassane Ouattara as he wants to stay in the Ivory Coast "because of the deterioration of the domestic security situation", his Ivorian Popular Front (FPI) party said.
Gbagbo has resisted international demands, sanctions and other pressure to hand over to Ouattara who is internationally recognized to have won elections in November.
Instead, party leader Pascal Affi N'Guessan and Gbagbo foreign minister Alcide Djedje had left for Addis Ababa to attend the meeting at the African Union headquarters, party public relations official Eric Ane told AFP.
The African Union invited the rivals to talks in its latest bid to end a dispute that has deteriorated into the worst conflict since clashes in 2004, with 370 people killed since mid-December, according to UN figures.
Ouattara, holed up in Abidjan's Golf Hotel under a blockade by forces loyal to Gbagbo, has accepted the invitation to the meeting, which will include five African presidents.
He is protected by troops of a United Nations mission in Ivory Coast and by former rebels of the New Forces, who control the northern half of the country.
Also invited to the Ethiopian capital was Paul Yao N'Dre, the head of the Constitutional Council that rejected the election authority's ruling that Gbagbo had lost the vote, backing his claims to still be in power.
However Yao N'Dre was not seen at the airport with the two officials headed to Ethiopia. It was not immediately possible to confirm if he was making the trip.
The five African leaders tasked by the African Union to resolve the dispute were due to meet in Addis Ababa Wednesday to finalize the positions they will present to talks Thursday, an official said.
The panel has been told to announce decisions to ending the bloody standoff by the end of the month, against a background of rising clashes in the main city, Abidjan, and the west of Ivory Coast.
The AU panel comprises Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, South Africa's Jacob Zuma, Idriss Deby Itno of Chad, Blaise Compaore of Burkina Faso and Tanzania's Jakaya Kikwete.
The United Nations has warned of a humanitarian crisis: at least 75,000 Ivorians have fled to Liberia because of the post-election conflict, its refugee agency said Tuesday.
Between 200,000 and 300,000 had also left their homes in Abidjan, the economic capital, where fighting intensified at the beginning of the month.
"The humanitarian and protection needs are growing fast," UNHCR spokesman Adrian Edwards said in Geneva.
Ivory Coast has been divided between north and south since a foiled coup bid against Gbagbo in September 2002, after which the rebel New Forces took control of half the country.
UN and French troops patrolled the ceasefire lines.
In 2007 the rival sides reached a peace agreement providing for the disarmament and the reunification of the country, but neither have yet taken place.
November's election, which was postponed several times since 2005, was meant to be a major step on the way to the restoration of stability and peace in the world's leading cocoa producer.
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