Three demobilized rebel fighters were killed on Tuesday in Ivory Coast’s second-biggest city of Bouake, as they clashed with police attempting to end their protest over bonus payments, the Ivorian Ministry of the Interior and a spokesman for the fighters said.
The ministry added that 14 others were wounded in the clashes, of which four seriously.
West Africa’s most important economy has rapidly recovered from a decade-long crisis that ended in a brief 2011 civil war, but unrest among mutinous soldiers and former rebels has exposed just how fragile those gains are.
Photo: Reuters
Bouake was at the epicenter of two major army mutinies this year that revealed Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara’s tenuous grasp on his military and associated armed groups.
The unrest also affected ports that ship cocoa out of the world’s leading producer, causing prices for the commodity to briefly spike.
Tuesday’s violence erupted after former members of a northern rebellion who helped Ouattara to power in 2011 — and are demanding 18 million CFA francs (US$30,669) as a reward — blocked the main southern entrance into Bouake.
Video showed the former rebels erecting barricades out of tree branches and the Ivorian flag.
Amadou Ouattara, a spokesman for the former rebels, said police had fired teargas before shooting into the crowd.
“It was three demobilized fighters who were killed. They were unarmed,” he said. “The police started shooting tear gas ... At the same time they started shooting [live bullets].”
A police officer on the scene said that the injuries were caused by a grenade the protesters had set off, a version of events later espoused by the interior ministry.
“[We are] certain the armed protesters set off an offensive grenade which exploded among them. The toll is three deaths and 14 wounded from fragments of the grenade, the ministry said in a statement.
It added that three gendarmes and two police officers were also wounded by projectiles.
Ouattara’s government last week agreed to pay about 8,400 mutinying soldiers 5 million CFA francs each, ceding to their demands in order to end a four-day uprising that blocked roads and shuttered businesses in most cities and towns.
However, the deal risks angering other factions in the military, which is still riven by civil war-era divisions between former rebels and former loyalist soldiers.
Tuesday’s protesters were part of a group of about 6,800 combatants demobilized following the conflict who claim they are still owed for their service.
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