IVORY COAST: Terrified residents of Ivory Coast's second city, Bouake, took refuge in their homes yesterday, fearing a bloody showdown between loyalist troops and rebel soldiers accused of trying to seize power.
The sound of automatic weapons fire rattled in the central market city after a 3 p.m. government deadline expired for the renegade troops to give up or face an overwhelming assault by the west African country's army.
President Laurent Gbagbo arrived home from Italy having abruptly cancelled a meeting with Pope John Paul II.
"I had to cut short my visit and take up my place at the head of the state and of the armed forces, to continue the combat that the soldiers have started," he told reporters at the airport, reinforced with scores of troops.
The government says it put down an attempted coup planned by former junta leader Gen Robert Guei, who was killed by security forces on Thursday. Gen Guei's 1999 coup in Ivory Coast, the world's top cocoa producer, ruined the country's stable reputation in troubled Africa. National television showed pictures of his body, his only evident wound a single gunshot to the head.
Fighting in Bouake died down during the morning and residents said most firing appeared to be in the air. "We beat off the gendarmes who attacked us, but now we hear that the government is trying to get help from Angola to send an armed column against us," one rebel commander told Reuters by telephone from Bouake.
Angola is a close ally of President Gbagbo, but an Angolan diplomat in Abidjan said Luanda had "neither the reason, nor the means" to intervene. Military sources said Angola had not sent troops.
Disgruntled soldiers captured Bouake and the northern city of Korhogo early on Thursday in a well-coordinated attack.
This is the worst strife to hit Ivory Coast since turbulent polls in 2000 revived fears that the country, riven by ethnic and political quarrels, could tumble into the anarchy that has ruined nearby Liberia and Sierra Leone.
Defence Minister Moise Lida Kouassi said on national television that the army was preparing to move in on Bouake, 350 km north of Abidjan, if the rebels did not meet the surrender deadline.
"Since this morning we put together all our logistic means and have got the support of friendly countries, so we are sure the town will be cleaned before nightfall," he said. The rebel commander said the time for talking was over and the people of Bouake had rallied in the streets to support his men.
He said that what had begun as a protest over army retirements had passed into "the phase of a rebellion".
Emergency workers collected bodies from where they fell on the streets of Abidjan. Military sources say dozens of soldiers, rebels and civilians were killed in gun battles.
Smoke billowed from the shanty town of Agban-Deux Plateaux, where residents said gendarmes had set fire to their homes. The district is home to some of the millions of the immigrants who play a vital economic role.
"They attacked our homes because they said the attackers were there, but I never saw any of them," said Ms Patricia Zeze, an Ivorian married to an immigrant from neighbouring Burkina Faso.