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April 12, 2011
Alassane Ouattara called for peace in Ivory Coast after the arrest of presidential rival Laurent Gbagbo on Monday, but he faces a huge challenge in uniting a country torn by civil war.
Ouattara’s supporters The United Nations confirmed on Monday that former President Gbagbo had surrendered and been captured.
Laurent Gbagbo He was widely expected to lose last November’s election after a decade in power, but he refused to step down to make way for the winner. Alassane Ouattaratriggering a bloody conflict in Côte d’Ivoire that lasted four months.
He was arrested on Monday after French and Ouattara forces surrounded the bunker where he had been hiding for the past week and is now under UN protection.
Our country has turned a painful page in its history. Alassane Ouattara
It is hoped that Gbagbo’s arrest marks the end of this violent chapter Ivory Coast – But many believe that the country is too divided to maintain peace.
In a speech late on Monday, Ouattara called for a “new era of hope.”
“I call on my compatriots to refrain from any form of revenge and violence. Our country’s history has turned a painful page,” he said, pledging to restore security to the devastated country, the world’s largest cocoa grower.
He also assured that Babo, his wife and aides would be brought to justice.
Read more in the Channel 4 News Special Report on the Ivory Coast conflict
Violence
According to reports, the conflict Racial violence and massacresespecially in the western part of the country.
Aid groups believe both Ouattara and Gbagbo’s forces have committed atrocities against civilians. Channel 4 News heard The United Nations found 118 bodies, calling it “appalling cruelty” in different places.
In his speech on Monday, Ouattara pledged to set up a South African-style truth and reconciliation commission to investigate human rights violations.
The president faces more pressing challenges in Abidjan, where days of fighting, dwindling food and medicine supplies and power outages have left many Concerns about a growing humanitarian crisisAs many as a million people have fled their homes across the country fearing escalating violence.
calm
Ouattara called for calm and asked for help from police and gendarmes, as well as UN and French forces, to restore security. But it was unclear whether Gbagbo’s supporters would give up the fight after his arrest, or whether 46 percent of Ivorian voters would accept his defeat.
Alex Vines, who led a UN inspection team and lived in Ivory Coast from 2005 to 2008, told Channel 4 News that unifying the country, which has been divided for more than a decade and plunged into civil war in 2002-2003, is now Ouattara’s main priority.
“His task is to mediate and bring the country together, which requires not only mediation but also opening a judicial process to examine allegations of human rights violations, including those committed by his own forces, such as those that took place a few weeks ago in western Ivory Coast,” he said.
Watch: John Sparks’ report on Barbour’s arrest
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