Global Policy Forum

Peacekeepers in war-divided Cote d'Ivoire will have to wait at least another three weeks for reinforcements, the UN Security Council said on Friday at the end of a week of ethnic violence that critics said highlighted how stretched the force in the West African nation was. The Security Council voted to extend the mandate of the ONUCI peacekeeping mission, which was due to expire on Saturday, by just three weeks until June 24, a copy of the resolution obtained by IRIN showed. After that they plan to adopt a second resolution approving extra troops and prolonging the mandate for another seven months.

Diplomats said that the delay in reinforcements, the third in as many months, was due to the fact that the U.S. Congress had yet to clear the extra peacekeepers. Washington pays about a quarter of the UN peacekeeping budget and U.S. lawmakers have demanded an advance say in all troop deployments to control costs. "We already have an agreement," Jean-Marc de La Sabliere, the French ambassador to the UN, said in a statement after the vote on Friday. "ONUCI will be reinforced by a battalion of 850 men and three police units." That would see some 1,200 extra personnel on the ground, falling short of a request by the UN's Special Representative to Cote d'Ivoire, Pierre Schori, for a further 2,000 troops to help keep the warring sides apart.

Cote d'Ivoire has been split into a government-controlled south and a rebel-held north -- with some 6,000 UN and 4,000 French peacekeepers currently patrolling the buffer zone in between -- since rebels tried to topple President Laurent Gbagbo almost three years ago. Ethnic violence this week around the western town of Duekoue, which saw some of the heaviest fighting during the short-lived civil war that followed the failed coup attempt, was a reminder of the tensions. Killings began before dawn on Wednesday when villagers belonging to the Guere ethnic group, seen as close to Gbagbo, were hacked, shot and burnt to death. On Thursday came the revenge slayings of Dioula people, who trace their roots back to northern Cote d'Ivoire and are thus viewed as being supporters of the rebels.The exact number of dead is still not known. Minster for Administrative Reforms Eric Kahe, who is from the region, said 70 people had been killed. UN officials in Abidjan have put the death toll at 56.

As some Duekoue residents criticised the UN peacekeepers for not protecting them, despite the fact the buffer zone lies just 50 km to the north, observers said getting more troops on the ground was a pressing concern. "The killings in Cote d'Ivoire this week tragically highlight why the Security Council must boost its peacekeeping force," said Peter Takirambudde, Africa director for the New York-based Human Rights Watch. "More UN peacekeepers are sorely needed." "The alarmingly high tension in Cote d'Ivoire's cocoa belt could result in violence on a massive scale, especially given the past willingness of political and local leaders to exploit ethnic differences and economic resentments," he added.

Pointing the finger

The ethnic conflict in the cocoa-rich Wild West predates the civil war but has been exacerbated by the nationwide split. And on Friday the blame game started. "These killings bear the hallmark of the rebels," Desire Tagro, the president's spokesman, said in a statement. The rebels countered quickly, pointing the finger at Gbagbo's ruling Ivorian Popular Front (FPI) party. "We accuse the FPI of being behind this operation of killing the people in the west," rebel spokesman Sidiki Konate was quoted as saying by Reuters news agency.

The Ivorian army and UN peacekeepers have sent extra troops to Duekoue, which lies near the border with Liberia. With Ivorian soldiers under orders to shoot on sight after curfew fell on Thursday night, there was no new wave of deaths but some residents were still fearful of reprisals and were trying to flee the town, where most shops still had the hatches battened down. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in New York said on Friday that it estimated more than 15,000 people had taken refuge at the Catholic Mission in Duekoue. It said the World Food Programme was organising food assistance for the displaced, the World Health Organisation was preparing to deploy to the town to evaluate health risks and the UN children's agency UNICEF was working with the International Committee of the Red Cross to build shelters. "We are putting up tarpaulins, we are building a couple of latrines and we have brought material like bleach, jerry cans, and water tanks for the displaced," Kadjo Yao of UNICEF told IRIN by telephone from the Catholic Mission. "The town is quiet." UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has urged the Ivorian authorities to open an inquiry into the violence, and called on "all parties concerned to refrain from any action that may lead to an escalation of tensions."

Observers are worried that the recent upsurge in violence could threaten disarmament, scheduled to begin on 27 June, and consequently elections due on 30 October that are meant to restore peace to the country that was once the beacon of West Africa. The UN Security Council on Friday urged all parties to ensure that disarmament started without delay. The 15-nation body also asked Annan to appoint a High Representative to specifically oversee Cote d'Ivoire's electoral preparations as well as the ballot itself to make sure that the process was "open, free, fair and transparent."

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