French soldiers killed in Ivory Coast bombing raid
Eight French soldiers were killed and 23 others injured today by Ivory Coast government troops bombing a rebel-held town in northern Ivory Coast, a Defence Ministry official said.
The French presidency said an American citizen also was killed in the raid by two Sukhoi fighter jets.
France sent three Mirage fighter jets to West Africa in response, and separately hit back by destroying the two Ivory Coast planes, French military officials said.
French President Jacques Chirac said in a statement that he ordered the “destruction” of the jets that violated Ivory Coast’s ceasefire, and said France was acting within the terms of a UN mandate for French forces overseeing a ceasefire in the country.
He also ordered the deployment of two more military companies to Ivory Coast.
The UN Security Council was meeting to discuss the situation in the West African country, the French Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
In Abidjan, the commercial capital and stronghold of the loyalist south, French troops fired into the air and shot tear gas to fend off angry loyalist mobs trying to storm the base.
Foreign Minister Michel Barnier urged Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo to “clearly assume his responsibilities and the role that is his to return the country to calm – especially in Abidjan”.
“We must immediately return to the path of peace,” he said.
