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I Coast: Mbeki consults leaders
08/11/2004 14:07 - (SA)
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| Ivory Coast government supporters demonstrate at a roadblock just out side the airport at Yamoussoukro, Ivory Coast. (Schalk van Zuydam, AP) |
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Cape Town - President Thabo Mbeki was consulting with west African leaders ahead of an emergency trip to Ivory Coast to settle the latest unrest, a foreign affairs spokesperson said on Monday.
Ronnie Mamoepa said Mbeki was "in talks with various leaders" about the situation in Ivory Coast but would not divulge any travel plans.
"President Mbeki has been requested by the African Union to assist in finding a political solution and will be heading to that country soon," he said. "For now he is consulting with West African leaders before he departs."
The African Union said on Sunday it would send Mbeki to press Ivory Coast to find a political solution to end renewed fighting with rebels in the west and north.
In a statement released on Sunday, AU Commission Chair Alpha Oumar Konare condemned the attacks by government forces on the various locations in the north of Ivory Coast, including those that hit the French forces.
Nine French soldiers and an American aid consultant were killed in bombing attacks Saturday in Ivory Coast's rebel-held north. French troops destroyed the Ivory Coast air force fleet in retaliation.
Konare stressed the need for a political solution to the conflict, and urged the government and the rebels to commit to negotiating a solution.
Ivory Coast, the world's top cocoa producer and West Africa's former economic powerhouse, has been split into rebel north and government south since a September 2002 coup attempt launched the country into civil war.
A 2003 peace deal, brokered under pressure from former colonial ruler France and others, ended major fighting until the government broke the cease-fire on Thursday.
- AP
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