'French, UN troops must leave'
2006-09-19 22:36
Paris - Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo said that French and UN peacekeepers were free to leave his country, while confirming his boycott of upcoming peace talks in New York, in remarks published on Tuesday.
In an interview with France's Le Monde newspaper, Gbagbo said the 4 000 French troops and the 7 000-strong UN peacekeeping force deployed to oversee the west African country's peace process had failed.
"I no longer expect peace to come from them. I don't expect anything from them anymore because their plan has failed," he said.
"If they want to leave, then let them... The present situation, in which they are holding us, is worse than war," he said, denying that a departure of foreign troops would lead to renewed bloodshed.
The Ivorian leader said he had not asked the foreign troops to leave, but was "thinking of an alternative plan to be put to the African Union".
'Talks not crucial'
Gbagbo also confirmed that he would not attend a high-level meeting on Ivory Coast during the UN General Assembly in New York on Wednesday, saying the talks were "informal" and were "nothing crucial".
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Friday urged Gbagbo to reconsider his boycott, and warned that the president's recent remarks rejecting the peace process could aggravate the situation in the country.
Gbagbo also lashed out at the work of the GTI - an international panel of diplomats working to end the four-year political crisis in the country, and in which France plays an important role.
"I am sick of having people on my back like this. This can go on for 10 years without settling anything," Gbagbo fumed.
Panel calls for sanctions
"They are biased and they are playing with the Ivorian people!"
The panel has suggested strengthening the powers of Ivorian Prime Minister Charles Konan Banny while reducing those of Gbagbo, and has called for targeted sanctions against those deemed to be hampering efforts to reunite the country.
Ivory Coast has been divided into a rebel-held north and a government-controlled south since an attempted coup against Gbagbo in 2002.
The UN had set October 31 as a deadline for presidential elections in Ivory Coast but it has since admitted that the date could not be maintained because of inadequate preparation.