NATO AIR
Senior Member
seems like they can't even hold a peace agreement together, why would we want them with a say in iraq?
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6404613/
Bombing kills 8 French soldiers in Ivory Coast
23 injured; military retaliates by destroying government fighter jets
MSNBC News Services
Updated: 11:21 a.m. ET Nov. 6, 2004
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast - Eight French soldiers were killed when Ivory Coast government warplanes bombed French positions in the rebel-held town of Bouake on Saturday, a United Nations official said.
The French military retaliated by destroying two Ivorian Sukhoi fighter jets on the ground at Yamoussoukro airport, a French military spokesman in Abidjan said.
Government warplanes carried out bombing raids across the rebel-held north for a third day on Saturday, fuelling fears of a slide back into full-blown hostilities in the worlds top cocoa grower which could threaten a fragile peace in the region.
Military sources from the U.N. said that two Sukhoi (warplanes) belonging to the Ivorian army have just been destroyed by the French after these aircraft targeted and hit a French target, said Jean-Victor Nkolo, spokesman for the U.N. mission in Ivory Coast.
Eight were killed and 23 wounded. All were French military, he said.
The French military spokesman said the French barracks in the rebel stronghold of Bouake had been hit, but he had no information on casualties.
Government warplanes attacked Bouake shortly after French and U.N. officials heard reports of machinegun and artillery fire around the city.
Bombs were dropped by planes (around 8 a.m. ET) ... and we heard sporadic machine gunfire at the southern entrance to the city, a U.N. official said by telephone from the U.N. peacekeeping base in Bouake.
Ivorian army warns of land invasion
Ivorian army officers have warned a land invasion would follow the air raids to chase out the rebels who have controlled the north since the war that followed their failed attempt to oust President Laurent Gbagbo in September 2002.
Some 10,000 French and U.N. soldiers police the buffer zone around a cease-fire line that separates the rebels from the government-run south.
U.N. peacekeepers stopped two army convoys trying to cross into the buffer zone on Friday, but rebel leaders have accused the multinational force of not doing more to counter the government attacks.
In the northwestern town of Man around a thousand protesters hurled Molotov cocktails at French forces, venting anger at what they saw as the former colonial powers slowness to intervene.
Two of our vehicles were burned and destroyed. Three stores containing food, water and petrol were burned down, said Henry Aussavy, spokesman for the French troops in Ivory Coast.
Medical aid group evacuates some staff
Aid workers in the rebel-held western town of Danane, just 17 miles from the border with Liberia, said they were preparing for an imminent attack.
Fearing a spread of the fighting, the France-based relief group Medecins Sans Frontieres, or Doctors Without Border, told The Associated Press Saturday it was evacuating some staff from its hospital in the western town of Danane, about 20 miles from Ivory Coasts border with Liberia. The west saw some of the most brutal attacks of the war.
We are very worried, the aid groups spokeswoman Vanessa van Schoor said. We really hope that the hospital will not be attacked. We still have patients inside. The population of Danane has suffered a great deal already in the war.
Van Schoor said the hospital would remain functioning. She declined to say how many staffers were being brought out or where they were being taken.
French Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie said on Friday the U.N. may beef up the mandate of the peacekeeping troops to prevent fighting between government forces and rebels.
The secretary general will be left with no choice but to give the forces specific rules of engagement that will allow them to deal with the situation, U.N. spokesman Nkolo said.
Something is being worked out as we speak and could be delivered today or tomorrow, he said.
The air raids have so far targeted Bouake and at least three towns to the east and west, the first major hostilities since a truce signed in May last year ended fighting which killed thousands and uprooted over a million.
The United Nations said 20 civilians and two rebels were killed in Fridays strikes alone.
War killed thousands
Ivory Coasts war killed thousands and uprooted more than 1 million, threatening efforts by neighboring countries Sierra Leone and Liberia to recover from their own vicious civil wars of the 1990s.
Last years peace deals, brokered under international pressure, ended major fighting but an agreed-upon power-sharing government has never taken hold.
The U.N. Security Council which has poured billions of dollars and thousands of peace troops into West and Central Africa to support peace accords expressed alarm at the renewed fighting, as have France, the United States and others.
Nigerian President Olosegun Obasanjo, current president of the African Union, opened talks with regional leaders Saturday at his farm on the outskirts of Nigerias commercial capital, Lagos, to look for a way out of the crisis.
Senior African Union officials were among those attending. Remi Oyo, Obasanjos spokeswoman, declined to say if Ivory Coast government or rebel representatives would take part.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6404613/
Bombing kills 8 French soldiers in Ivory Coast
23 injured; military retaliates by destroying government fighter jets
MSNBC News Services
Updated: 11:21 a.m. ET Nov. 6, 2004
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast - Eight French soldiers were killed when Ivory Coast government warplanes bombed French positions in the rebel-held town of Bouake on Saturday, a United Nations official said.
The French military retaliated by destroying two Ivorian Sukhoi fighter jets on the ground at Yamoussoukro airport, a French military spokesman in Abidjan said.
Government warplanes carried out bombing raids across the rebel-held north for a third day on Saturday, fuelling fears of a slide back into full-blown hostilities in the worlds top cocoa grower which could threaten a fragile peace in the region.
Military sources from the U.N. said that two Sukhoi (warplanes) belonging to the Ivorian army have just been destroyed by the French after these aircraft targeted and hit a French target, said Jean-Victor Nkolo, spokesman for the U.N. mission in Ivory Coast.
Eight were killed and 23 wounded. All were French military, he said.
The French military spokesman said the French barracks in the rebel stronghold of Bouake had been hit, but he had no information on casualties.
Government warplanes attacked Bouake shortly after French and U.N. officials heard reports of machinegun and artillery fire around the city.
Bombs were dropped by planes (around 8 a.m. ET) ... and we heard sporadic machine gunfire at the southern entrance to the city, a U.N. official said by telephone from the U.N. peacekeeping base in Bouake.
Ivorian army warns of land invasion
Ivorian army officers have warned a land invasion would follow the air raids to chase out the rebels who have controlled the north since the war that followed their failed attempt to oust President Laurent Gbagbo in September 2002.
Some 10,000 French and U.N. soldiers police the buffer zone around a cease-fire line that separates the rebels from the government-run south.
U.N. peacekeepers stopped two army convoys trying to cross into the buffer zone on Friday, but rebel leaders have accused the multinational force of not doing more to counter the government attacks.
In the northwestern town of Man around a thousand protesters hurled Molotov cocktails at French forces, venting anger at what they saw as the former colonial powers slowness to intervene.
Two of our vehicles were burned and destroyed. Three stores containing food, water and petrol were burned down, said Henry Aussavy, spokesman for the French troops in Ivory Coast.
Medical aid group evacuates some staff
Aid workers in the rebel-held western town of Danane, just 17 miles from the border with Liberia, said they were preparing for an imminent attack.
Fearing a spread of the fighting, the France-based relief group Medecins Sans Frontieres, or Doctors Without Border, told The Associated Press Saturday it was evacuating some staff from its hospital in the western town of Danane, about 20 miles from Ivory Coasts border with Liberia. The west saw some of the most brutal attacks of the war.
We are very worried, the aid groups spokeswoman Vanessa van Schoor said. We really hope that the hospital will not be attacked. We still have patients inside. The population of Danane has suffered a great deal already in the war.
Van Schoor said the hospital would remain functioning. She declined to say how many staffers were being brought out or where they were being taken.
French Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie said on Friday the U.N. may beef up the mandate of the peacekeeping troops to prevent fighting between government forces and rebels.
The secretary general will be left with no choice but to give the forces specific rules of engagement that will allow them to deal with the situation, U.N. spokesman Nkolo said.
Something is being worked out as we speak and could be delivered today or tomorrow, he said.
The air raids have so far targeted Bouake and at least three towns to the east and west, the first major hostilities since a truce signed in May last year ended fighting which killed thousands and uprooted over a million.
The United Nations said 20 civilians and two rebels were killed in Fridays strikes alone.
War killed thousands
Ivory Coasts war killed thousands and uprooted more than 1 million, threatening efforts by neighboring countries Sierra Leone and Liberia to recover from their own vicious civil wars of the 1990s.
Last years peace deals, brokered under international pressure, ended major fighting but an agreed-upon power-sharing government has never taken hold.
The U.N. Security Council which has poured billions of dollars and thousands of peace troops into West and Central Africa to support peace accords expressed alarm at the renewed fighting, as have France, the United States and others.
Nigerian President Olosegun Obasanjo, current president of the African Union, opened talks with regional leaders Saturday at his farm on the outskirts of Nigerias commercial capital, Lagos, to look for a way out of the crisis.
Senior African Union officials were among those attending. Remi Oyo, Obasanjos spokeswoman, declined to say if Ivory Coast government or rebel representatives would take part.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
