'Robust' UN force wanted
2003-11-25 08:29
New York - Despite a nearly year-old peace accord, Ivory Coast is sliding toward chaos and needs more help from the international community to prevent further turmoil that could spread to other parts of West Africa, regional officials said.
Speaking to the UN Security Council on Monday, a delegation from the Economic Community Of West African States (Ecowas) urged the world body to assume peacekeeping duties in Ivory Coast to prevent simmering tensions from returning to full-fledged war between the government and northern rebels.
The delegation from the group known as Ecowas has previously called for UN peacekeepers to replace its 1 200-member West African force in Ivory Coast, but this was its first formal request to the Security Council.
"In our consideration, the peace process in Ivory Coast would benefit from the stronger presence that a UN peacekeeping force represents," said Nana Akufo-Addo, the foreign minister of Ghana and the head of the Ecowas delegation, after meeting with Security Council members.
The West Africans plan to repeat their request on Tuesday at a meeting with Secretary of State Colin Powell in Washington.
On November 13, the Security Council voted unanimously to extend until February 4 the small UN Ivory Coast mission of fewer than 100 unarmed military officers, and it called for a report in January on whether that mission should be expanded.
The council will take up the Ecowas request at the January meeting, said Angola's UN ambassador, Ismael Gaspar Martins, the current Security Council president.
'We're open'
US Ambassador John Negroponte said that the United States will wait until the January report before announcing its decision. "We're open to the suggestion," he said.
Earlier, U.S. Deputy Ambassador James Cunningham said the United States wants more information about the proposed size of the peacekeeping force and whether it would be more effective than the French and Ecowas troops now enforcing the peace accord signed in January.
Akufo-Addo did not specify the number of UN peacekeepers that Ecowas believes are necessary for Ivory Coast, but during the open session of the Security Council he said it should be a "robust" force capable of security the entire territory of the former French colony.
"We strongly believe that this step will be decisive for the peace process in Ivory Coast," Akufo-Addo said. "The peoples of West Africa... need your patience and assistance at this critical juncture of their history."
Fighting broke out in Ivory Coast on September 19, 2002, when rebels attempted to oust the president of a country that was long among the most stable and economically prosperous in the region.
The war was declared over on July 4, 2003, but the peace process has stalled. Rebels accuse President Laurent Gbagbo of not adhering to the peace accord and have pulled out of the power-sharing government, while the president insists the rebels disarm.
- AP