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Ivory Coast PM's plane draws gunfire

Members of the New Forces movement view the damaged fuselage of Ivory Coast Prime Minister Guillaume Soro 's plane after it was hit by a rocket in Bouake, Ivory Coast. PHOTO: AFP

A plane carrying Ivory Coast's prime minister came under heavy gunfire as it landed on Friday at an airport in the country's north, but the leader was not harmed, his spokesman said.

Three other people were killed by the force of the landing at Bouake airport, roughly 400km from the country's commercial capital, Abidjan, said Alain Lobognon, a spokesman for Prime Minister Guillaume Soro.

Soro, an ex-rebel leader, became prime minister in April in a peace deal brokered a month earlier.

It allowed him to become the titular head of government in return for stability and the reunification of Ivory Coast, which since 2002 has been cleaved into a rebel-controlled north and a government-ruled south.

Until the March 4 signing of the peace deal, Bouake was the capital of the rebel-held south, run by Soro's men -- and although no one has claimed responsibility for the attack, some speculated the assailants were part of a group that opposed the peace deal.

"This attack is not surprising. We know that within the rebel movement there are those that do not agree with the peace accord," said Innocent Anakai Kobena, head of the Movement of the Forces of the Future, a group that opposes the New Forces rebels, which until recently was commanded by Soro.

They see it as a process that only benefits Guillaume Soro and those close to him," he said.

The attackers fired on the plane as it was landing, said Sidiki Konate -- another Soro aide -- who was sitting near the prime minister in the VIP cabin.

"We heard the sound of heavy explosions and then several volleys of shots," Konate told French radio.

"There was time for everyone to get down. The pilot was able to land," he said.

Both Konate and Lobognon said three were killed during the attack and several passengers were seriously wounded.

The attack on Friday could set back Ivory Coast's nascent peace deal, under which Soro joined hands in government with his former enemy, President Laurent Gbagbo, who had controlled the south as Soro had controlled the north.

As many as 9,000 UN troops and 3,500 French soldiers are deployed in Ivory Coast, many patrolling the buffer zone that runs east to west, dividing the country, which is the world's largest cocoa producer.

The peacekeepers were preparing to leave soon, however, as Ivorians have begun dismantling the buffer zone since the March 4 peace deal, called the Ouagadougou accord after the capital of Burkina Faso where it was signed.

The accord has been seen as the most promising peace after several previous ones failed to take hold.

French Foreign Affairs Minister Bernard Kouchner issued a statement in Paris condemning Friday's attack and offered medical assistance in Bouake.

France "underlines the overriding necessity of continuing the reconciliation process started under the Ouagadougou accord," Kouchner said in a statement.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon also condemned Friday's attack and called on all Ivorian parties "to continue to work together and in close consultation with the United Nations toward implementing the Ouagadougou agreement," UN spokeswoman Michele Montas said at UN headquarters in New York.
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