Cote d' Ivoire Govt. Troops Retake Two Key Towns

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Sunday, September 29, 2002

Cote d' Ivoire Govt. Troops Retake Two Key Towns

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The government troops of Cote d' Ivoire Saturday recaptured two key towns after launching an offensive toward the strategic central city of Bouake, which has been held by mutineers since a bloody uprising on Sept. 19.

An army spokesman told reporters that the loyalist troops retook the towns of Tiebissou and Sakasso, both of which are located between Bouake and the capital Yamoussoukro, and were moving towards Bouake from several directions.

The advance contingents of the government forces have already taken up positions in Bouake, the country's second biggest city, the spokesman said.

Defense Minister Moise Lida Kouassi has declared that Bouake and northern town of Korhogo were war zones and vowed to retake the two rebel-held strongholds.

The bloody uprising in the cocoa-rich country has plunged Cote d' Ivoire into its worst crisis since its independence from Francein 1960 and has claimed over 400 lives and left thousands of people homeless.

The shadow of more bloody fighting is thickening as the mutineers had reportedly seized a third strategic town of Odienne in the northwest, giving the rebels almost total control of the northern section of Cote d' Ivoire that runs along the borders of neighboring Burkina Faso and Mali.

On Saturday, the government of Cote d' Ivoire asked former colonial power France for logistical help to fight the rebels, whowere accused of staging a coup attempt to overturn the government.

Prime Minister Pascal Affi N'Guessan said his country does not wish to have French troops come to fight for it as it has brave soldiers and a mobilized population.

"We wish to have a logistic support to enable us to face up to this aggression," he said.

In its response, France announced Saturday it would provide logistical support to help the government of Cote d' Ivoire tacklea revolt by mutinous soldiers.

"We are mobilized to guarantee the safety of the French community in Cote d'Ivoire and we are also providing logistical support to the Cote d' Ivoire's authorities," a statement from theFrench Foreign Ministry said.

France also supports the idea of a west African intervention force to help end the continuing violence, the statement said.

Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade said on Friday that the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) is ready to send a peacekeeping force of 3,000 to 4,000 soldiers to help the government of Cote d' Ivoire restore stability in the strife-torn country.

To help put down nine-day-long military uprising, Nigeria and Ghana Thursday put troops on standby and agreed to send warplanes to Cote d' Ivoire.

Meanwhile, an ECOWAS extraordinary summit on the spate of violent unrest in the country is expected to take place on Sunday in Ghana's capital Accra.

The ECOWAS groups 15 members, namely Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Gambia, Guinea, Ghana, Cote d' Ivoire, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo.

Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, who is a key player in the west African sub-region, and President Blaise Campaore of Burkina Faso, who has been alleged of being involved in the unrestin neighboring Cote d' Ivoire, will attend the extraordinary summit.

According to ECOWAS Executive Secretary Mohamed Ibn Chambas, Campaore will hold bilateral talks with Cote d' Ivoire's PresidentLaurent Gbagbo at the summit, where the west African leaders are expected to agree to send a peacekeeping force to the troubled country.

South African President Thabo Mbeki, chairman of the newly-established African Union, is to attend the summit.

Chambas said the rebels had not been invited to Accra "because this is a summit of heads of state."

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