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Ivory
Coast seeks donor funds to keep polls on track |
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(July
4,2008) ABIDJAN - Ivory Coast urgently needs
nearly $100 million from donors to finance preparations for elections
in November and pay disgruntled rebels who staged a brief revolt at
the weekend, officials said on Wednesday.
Dissident followers of a sacked rebel chief in western Ivory Coast
fought on Saturday with soldiers from the New Forces rebel movement
which supports an internationally backed peace process in the world's
No. 1 cocoa producer.
The national reunification process, launched by a deal signed last
year by President Laurent Gbagbo and the New Forces insurgents who
fought him in a 2002/2003 civil war, is due to culminate in a presidential
election on Nov. 30.
But Gbagbo's government is insisting the international community speed
up delivery of assistance to fund poll preparations and the demobilisation
of ex-combatants.
"We need 40 billion CFA francs ($96 million) now, by the end
of this month," an official at Prime Minister Guillaume Soro's
press office said on Wednesday.
"The (peace) process could suffer because of how slow the donors
are," the official told Reuters, adding that Ivory Coast had
so far only received 6 billion CFA francs of assistance, out of nearly
200 billion CFA promised a year ago by donors.
The clashes at the weekend at Seguela and Vavoua in the western cocoa
belt, more than 400 km (250 miles) northwest of the main commercial
city Abidjan, killed three civilians and one dissident insurgent,
a local television journalist said. |
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