Agenzia Fides REPORT - “Apart from some sporadic strikes, the situation is calm. There are displaced people in all the parishes of Abidjan. Just in the Cathedral we have welcomed 2,000 displaced. However, we need food and medicine,” says Mons.Yessoh Pierre Claver N’Guessan, Vicar General for the Archdiocese of Abidjan, the administrative capital of Côte d'Ivoire, where attempts to forcibly remove the former President Laurent Gbagbo from his residence have failed. Yesterday evening, April 7, the President-elect, Alassane Ouattara, in a speech to the nation, launched an appeal for national reconciliation. He also declared that his forces will not attempt new assaults on Gbagbo's residence They will simply surround it, and wait for the former President and his men to surrender when the food and water run out.
“I do not think that the fighting will resume. I think that a negotiated solution will prevail, but it will take some time,” says the Vicar. “The real problem will be to reconcile the Ivorians. It will be very difficult to bring the supporters of each together again. The involvement of France, the United States and the African Union has greatly divided Ivorians,” he concludes.
Ouattara's forces, backed by the United Nations Mission in Côte d'Ivoire and the French soldiers of the “Force Licorne”, currently control the majority of the country. Gbagbo is barricaded in the presidential residence, transformed into a bunker, along with about 200 supporters.
“I do not think that the fighting will resume. I think that a negotiated solution will prevail, but it will take some time,” says the Vicar. “The real problem will be to reconcile the Ivorians. It will be very difficult to bring the supporters of each together again. The involvement of France, the United States and the African Union has greatly divided Ivorians,” he concludes.
Ouattara's forces, backed by the United Nations Mission in Côte d'Ivoire and the French soldiers of the “Force Licorne”, currently control the majority of the country. Gbagbo is barricaded in the presidential residence, transformed into a bunker, along with about 200 supporters.
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