I Coast tops summit agenda
2004-11-26 19:33
Ouagadougou - Leaders from French-speaking countries opened their 10th summit on Friday in the Burkina Faso capital Ouagadougou, with the crisis in Ivory Coast, once Francophone West Africa's brightest light, topping the agenda.
"A few hours' drive from here, one of us is going through a deep crisis," French President Jacques Chirac said in a keynote address, implicitly referring to Ivory Coast.
"We must send a message that is both firm and friendly so that both parties renounce the policy of violence, drop the illusion that there is a military solution and resume dialogue, which is the only way to peace," Chirac said.
The international community has "decided to do all it can to halt the spiral of self-destruction of a great nation that is very dear and close to us".
The UN has slapped an arms embargo on Ivory Coast after new unrest flared early this month after government planes bombed key positions in the rebel-held north of the country divided since a failed September 2002 coup sparked a civil war.
Nine French peacekeepers and a US aid worker were killed in the final strike on a French base in the rebel stronghold of Bouake, prompting a sharp riposte from France that wiped out the tiny Ivorian air force.
France's retaliation triggered a fury of anti-foreigner violence and vandalism in the commercial capital Abidjan that seeped down the coast to the port city of San Pedro.
Thousands of foreigners have been evacuated from the former French colony, while nearly 20 000 Ivorian citizens have poured across the border into Liberia to escape the unrest.
Condemns deadly attacks
Government ministers drafted a resolution on Ivory Coast ahead of the Francophone summit to be put to the 20 heads of state and government attending the meeting before it wraps up on Saturday.
The draft resolution condemns the raids on the north by the loyalist military and demands that all sides in the conflict "strictly" apply a French-brokered peace pact reached in January 2003, according to a document seen by AFP.
"Marcoussis and Accra III are the only way to achieve lasting reconciliation in Ivory Coast," the draft said, referring to the town outside Paris where the pact was signed and a July meeting of 12 African heads of state in the Ghanaian capital to try to revive the moribund accord.
The text "firmly condemns the deadly attacks by the Ivorian armed forces in northern Ivory Coast, including against the (French peacekeeping) Unicorn Force, acting under UN mandate".
It also "denounces atrocities committed against foreigners and the civilian population in general" following the bombing raids and the French response.
Chirac insisted in his speech that "France is a friend of Ivory Coast. We are not there to impose our brand of peace but to try to avoid civil war and chaos."