13 dead in west Ivory Coast clashes

At least 13 people were killed in clashes in the west Ivory Coast town of Duekoue and at a nearby camp for displaced people, residents said on Friday. "I have counted at least nine dead in the camp for displaced people, most of them young men," one resident told AFP by telephone. The number of bodies, which comes on top of four people already reported dead overnight, was confirmed by a local United Nations official and a journalist. The four were killed overnight in Duekoue, triggering reprisals by youths who blamed a group of displaced people and burnt their nearby camp, residents said. "An attack carried out on Thursday night in the Kokoma district of Duekoue, inhabited mostly by ethnic Malinke, claimed four lives," a resident told AFP. Western security sources and a local journalist confirmed the toll. These sources said youths from Kokoma had afterwards attacked a displaced persons' camp at Niambly on the outskirts of town, populated mainly by Guere people who fled there during the post-election crisis sparked by ex-president Laurent Gbagbo's refusal to admit defeat to current leader Alassane Ouattara. The Malinke are seen as Ouattara supporters, while the Guere are considered to be pro-Gbagbo. Several sources said that the youths were accompanied by soldiers and traditional hunters who serve as auxiliaries to the army. "They went to the camp, first of all destroyed the entrance, then burned down the camp," a security source said. "There was panic here, people were fleeing the camp," a resident said. "Since this morning there has been shooting in the town and at the moment we can still hear shooting from the displaced persons' camp," said an employee of the UN refugee agency, asking not to be named. The UN mission in Ivory Coast was charged with guarding the Niambly camp. But a staff member of the UNHCR refugee agency and a local journalist said the mission was overwhelmed by the crowd and "far too small". "I cannot understand what happened for the UN not to be able to contain the crowd that was seeking revenge," said Cyprien Ahouret, a priest at Duekoue's Roman Catholic mission. Regretting that what has been presented as a robbery led to the tragedy he added: "When there is a crisis here, ethnic groups are taking advantage." Several sources said the youths who attacked the camp where accompanied by members of the FRCI armed forces loyal to the president and Dozo hunters, renowned across West Africa for their supposedly mystical powers. "They went to the camp, and first destroyed the entrance, then they set fire to the camp," a Western security official said. A resident said in the afternoon that after shots were fired in the city and especially at the camp in the morning calm had returned. Witnesses said that members of the UN mission deployed in districts mainly inhabited by Guere people and around the Catholic mission and that FRCI forces could also be seen in the town. Some displaced people sought refuge inside the Catholic mission, while others were wandering around the town looking for shelter, residents said. Many also went the local hospital, a staff member there said. "Several dozen people with knife wounds have already arrived. We are sending them to surgery," he said. No official casualty toll was immediately released. A soldier said that the troops were looking for the "unidentified" people who had allegedly killed the four people in Duekoue. "We still haven't laid hands on them," he said. Long prone to serious ethnic tensions based on land disputes, the west of Ivory Coast remains the most unstable part of the country more than a year after the end of the post-electoral crisis of December 2010 to April 2011, which claimed some 3,000 lives, including hundreds in the Duekoue region. Several villages came under attack in early June south of Duekoue, close to the border with Liberia. More than 20 people were killed, including seven UN peacekeeping troops from Niger serving with the UN mission in Ivory Coast.