Johannesburg — West African mediators, trying to broker a peace deal between the Cote d'Ivoire government and rebels, handed both delegations in nearby Togo a fresh draft peace plan Thursday to try to end the nine-week war.
Meanwhile, United Nations' agencies launched a US$16m appeal in a bid to avert what they are calling a prospective humanitarian crisis in Cote d'Ivoire. A statement from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said a "fast and adequate response" was imperative to help people affected by the conflict, including tens of thousands who have fled the fighting or fear of reprisals. A senior UN official said "What is specific here is if we let things disintegrate in Ivory Coast, the entire region will suffer".
The OCHA statement said UN agencies reckoned up to four million people needed urgent assistance and that the money would cover basic requirements such as shelter, water, sanitation, food, health, education and protection in Cote d'Ivoire and the sub-region in the next three months.
Anti-foreigner feeling is rife, with pro-government supporters in Cote d'Ivoire accusing neighbouring countries and their nationals of backing the rebels. This has fuelled simmering ethnic tensions in a country that was once a haven of peace, stability and tolerance.
The UN emergency appeal coincided with renewed efforts by West African negotiators, led by Togolese president Gnassingbe Eyadema, to end the political deadlock which has stalled the talks. The mediators are desperate to find some common ground between Ivorian government representatives and the rebels who tried to oust President Laurent Gbagbo in an uprising on 19 September.
A ceasefire agreed last month, and monitored by the former colonial power France, is still holding. But Cote d'Ivoire remains a divided nation, with the rebels controlling the mainly Muslim north and the strategic central city of Bouake, while the authorities remain in charge of the coastal metropolis and economic capital, Abidjan, in the south.
Both sides have been rearming during the impasse in the Togo talks, with reports from Cote d'Ivoire of growing frustration at the slow pace of the negotiations.
Togo's foreign minister, Kofi Panou, told reporters Thursday that both sides were studying the new peace proposals which, he said, took account of points submitted by both the government and rebel camps.
The talks in the Togolese capital, Lome, have entered their fourth week, but with little visible progress as the rival sides stick to their positions. The rebels earlier rejected an initial draft accord and handed in their suggested changes to the mediators this week, including a call for a new "political order." They did not define precisely what this would entail. The government delegation also put forward fresh recommendations.
The rebels' main demand to date has been the resignation of the president, to clear the way, they say, for fresh elections. They claim Gbagbo's government is neither legitimate nor representative of Cote d'Ivoire and that the Ivorian leader has continued a policy of discrimination against northerners and immigrants from neighbouring countries, who make up between a third and a quarter of the 16-million population.
Gbagbo has insisted that the dissidents must disarm, which the rebels have refused to do.
On Thursday, the civilian leader of the Patriotic Movement of Cote d'Ivoire (MPCI -- the political branch of the rebellion) Guillaume Soro, told Radio France International nothing had changed. "We consider the crisis in Cote d'Ivoire both profound and serious and we must present the people with new proposals which will foster reconciliation and kick start a new Cote d'Ivoire".
The rebels also this week rebuffed Gbagbo's pledge to hold a referendum on changing the constitution. On national television, one outspoken pro-Gbagbo youth leader, Charles Ble-Goude, warned "One we must not play the game of these hooligan rebels who want to win time".
Asked whether the new Cote d'Ivoire the rebels envisaged would still be led by Gbagbo as head of state, Soro replied "Out of the question. That is not even an issue. You know, we have demanded that Gbagbo goes, followed by democratic, transparent and historic elections. And, for now, the demands of the Patriotic Movement of Cote d'Ivoire remain the same".
But Panou told Reuters there was no question of negotiating the departure of Gbagbo.
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The rebels temporarily pulled out of the talks in Togo on 9 November, after the brother of one of the MPCI's leading officials --who recently defected from Gbagbo's Popular Front Party (FPI) --was killed in Abidjan.
The two sides, who met President Eyadema separately on Thursday, were expected to get back together for direct negotiations in Lome on Friday (today).
Eyadema was designated the coordinator of a high level West African contact group on Cote d'Ivoire by his peers last month, in a move by regional leaders determined to halt the spread of the conflict, in which hundreds have been killed, across Ivorian borders.
The Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) has agreed to send regional peacekeepers to replace the French buffer force currently supervising the ceasefire. An advance guard of 19 Ecowas military officers has already arrived in Cote d'Ivoire, preparing for the deployment of more than a thousand troops, likely to be commanded by Senegal, the current chair of the regional organisation.
