UN Warns of Cote d'Ivoire Abductions

 Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire

The United Nations has raised concern over growing reports of killings and abductions in the ongoing political crisis in Cote d'Ivoire following last month’s disputed presidential polls.

 The UN high commissioner for human rights Navi Pillay has said that there is evidence of “massive violation of human rights” in the country, owing to hundreds of received reports of night-time abductions by armed men in military uniforms.

 In a statement issued on Sunday, Pillay said that over 50 people have been killed, including 10 members of the security forces and more than 200 killed since the violence broke out on Thursday. She claimed the armed groups behind the armed abductions had been accompanied by elements of the defence and security forces or militia groups.

 Pillay said the abducted persons are reportedly taken by force to illegal places of detention where they are held without charges and some have been found dead in questionable circumstances.

 Incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo has declined calls from the UN, African Union, the US and former colonial power France to relinquish power to Alassane Ouattara who is being internationally recognized as winner of the 28 November elections.

 Gbagbo was declared winner by the country’s constitutional council after it cancelled votes in parts of the north, a rebel held region where Ouattara hails from.

 UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has rejected the call by Gbagbo to pull its forces out of the country, accusing the mission of backing and arming Ouattara’s supporters.

 Both leaders have sworn themselves in as president at different occasions. Ouattara is being under an 800-strong UN troop’s protection in a hotel where he has his headquarters in the capital, Abidjan.

 French President Nicholas Sarkozy issued a warning to him on Friday to quit office by Sunday or face European Union sanctions.

 Britain joined the US and France in advising their citizen to leave the country, citing mounting political tension that has led to fear of renewed civil conflict.

 Khartoum, Sudan

Thousands Flee Darfur in Renewed Clashes

The United Nations has reported that over 12,000 people have fled following fresh clashes between government forces and rebel movements in Darfur.

The UN peacekeeping mission in Darfur-UNAMID said in a statement on Sunday that it had noticed that approximately 12,000 people fled the area and are heading towards the already overcrowded internally displaced persons camps and settlements near El Fasher in North Darfur.

Sudan’s army attacked fighters from Sudan Liberation Movement under Minni Minnawi on Friday following earlier clashes the previous week. The Sudan’s army had declared Minnawi a military target for accusations of breaking a ceasefire agreement and plotting to join rebel movements still fighting the government.

Minnawi, the only Darfur rebel leader to sign a peace accord with the government in 2006, accused last week of failing to implement it, said he is “ready to do battle.” The government’s engagement with the fighters at least three times this month has drawn criticism from UN envoys.

According to UN records about 300,000 people have been killed in Darfur and thousands displaced since 2003 when rebels in the region took up arms against the government in protest over discrimination against Sudanese Arabs.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) last year issued a warrant of arrest for President Omar Al Bashir and two others for war crimes and crimes against humanity, charges he denies.

The southerners in Sudan are expected to vote in a referendum on independence early next year as part of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended two decade-long civil strife between the north and south.

Logistic reasons and outstanding issues have seen to hinder preparations of the January 9 exercise which has attracted international interest.

Earlier in the weekend a local administrator in the contested oil-rich Abyei region said that the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) was deploying more troops in the south Kordorfan state which borders the south.

President Bashir in a speech on Sunday said the country will adopt entirely Islamic constitution with Arabic as official language if the south breaks away.

In a publication of diplomatic cables obtained by Wikileaks on the Guardian newspaper Bashir is accused by the ICC’s chief prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo of siphoning of about $9 billion of the country’s funds which are hidden in foreign accounts.

Local residents from Abyei were supposed to vote in a simultaneous vote along with the south’s independence on whether to remain in the north or join the south if it secedes, but voting rights for residents and exact border line remains contentious.