The Second Ivorian Civil War broke out in March 2011 when the crisis in Ivory Coast escalated into full-scale military conflict between forces loyal to Laurent Gbagbo, the President of Ivory Coast since 2000, and supporters of the internationally recognised president-elect Alassane Ouattara.
After months of unsuccessful negotiations and sporadic violence between supporters of the two sides, the crisis entered a critical stage as Ouattara's forces seized control of most of the country with the help of the UN, with Gbagbo entrenched in Abidjan, the country's largest city. International organizations have reported numerous instances of human rights violations by both sides, in particular in the city of Duékoué where Ouattara's forces killed hundreds of people. Around 3,000 people were killed in the conflict. UN and French forces took military action, with the stated objective to protect their forces and civilians. France's forces arrested Gbagbo at his residence on 11 April 2011.
Background
A civil war was fought in Ivory Coast between 2002 and 2004 between the incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo and the rebel Forces Nouvelles de Côte d'Ivoire (New Forces), representing Muslim northerners who felt that they were being discriminated against by the politically dominant and mostly Christian southerners.
In 2002 France sent its troops to Ivory Coast (Opération Licorne) as peacekeepers. In February 2004 the United Nations established the United Nations Operation in Côte d'Ivoire (UNOCI) "to facilitate the implementation by the Ivorian parties of the peace agreement signed by them in January 2003". Most of the fighting ended by late 2004, with the country split between a rebel-held north and a government-held south. In March 2007 the two sides signed an agreement to hold fresh elections, though they ended up being delayed until 2010, five years after Gbagbo's term of office was supposed to have expired.
After northern candidate Alassane Ouattara was declared the victor of the 2010 Ivorian presidential election by the country's Independent Electoral Commission (CEI), the President of the Constitutional Council – an ally of Gbagbo – declared the results to be invalid and that Gbagbo was the winner. Both Gbagbo and Ouattara claimed victory and took the presidential oath of office.
The international community, including the United Nations, the African Union, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the European Union, the United States, and former colonial power France affirmed their support for Ouattara, who was "almost universally acknowledged to have defeated [Gbagbo] at the ballot box," and called for Gbagbo to step down. On 18 December, Gbagbo ordered all UN peacekeepers to leave the country. The UN refused and the UN Security Council extended the mandate of the UN Mission in Ivory Coast until 30 June 2011. However, negotiations to resolve the dispute failed to achieve any satisfactory outcome. Hundreds of people were killed in escalating violence between pro-Gbagbo and pro-Ouattara partisans and at least a million people fled, mostly from Abidjan.
Conflict
After the disputed election, sporadic outbreaks of violence took place, particularly in Abidjan, where supporters of Ouattara clashed repeatedly with government forces and militias. Gbagbo's forces were said to be responsible for a campaign of assassinations, beatings and abductions directed against Ouattara's supporters.
The violence escalated through March 2011 with a number of incidents in Abidjan in which dozens of people were reported killed. In one of the deadliest single incidents, up to 30 people were killed on 17 March in a rocket attack on a pro-Ouattara suburb of Abidjan. The UN issued a statement saying that the shelling was "an act, perpetrated against civilians, [that] could constitute a crime against humanity." 52 people were killed in further violence in Abidjan Between 21 and 26 March.
Fighting also broke out in western Ivory Coast at the end of February 2011. On 25 February, the New Forces captured the towns of Zouan Hounien and Binhouye near the border with Liberia and took control of nearby Toulepleu on 7 March. The town of Doké fell on 12 March as the New Forces pushed on towards Bloléquin, which they took on 21 March after heavy fighting.
On 28 March, the New Forces – now renamed the Republican Forces of Côte d'Ivoire (RFCI) – launched a full-scale offensive across the country. Ouattara issued a statement declaring: "All the peaceful routes to lead Laurent Gbagbo to admit his defeat have been exhausted." The towns of Duékoué and Daloa in the west of the country were captured by the RFCI, as were Bondoukou and Abengourou near the border with Ghana in the east. On 30 March, Ivory Coast's political capital Yamoussoukro and the western town of Soubré were taken without resistance. The port city of San Pédro, the world's largest cocoa exporting port, fell to the RFCI in the early hours of 31 March as did the nearby coastal town of Sassandra. On the same day Ivory Coast's borders with neighbouring countries were ordered to be sealed by Ouattara's forces.
On 30 March United Nations Security Council Resolution 1975 was issued which, in particular, urged all Ivorian parties to respect the will of the people and the election of Alassane Ouattara as President of Ivory Coast, as recognised by ECOWAS, the African Union and the rest of the international community and reiterated that UNOCI could use "all necessary measures" in its mandate to protect civilians under imminent threat of attack.
The fighting was reported to have caused heavy damage in some contested towns, from which the inhabitants were said to have fled en masse. Large numbers of people were said to have found dead after Ouattara's forces took control of the central Ivorian towns; in Duékoué alone, over 800 people were reported to have been killed, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross, though responsibility for the massacres was unclear. Ouattara's government stated that numerous mass graves had been found in "Toulepleu, Bloléquin and Guiglo, whose authors are none other than the loyal forces, mercenaries and militias of Laurent Gbagbo." However, the United Nations blamed the RFCI for many of the deaths.
Battle of Abidjan
In Abidjan, heavy fighting broke out on 31 March as pro-Ouattara forces advanced on the city from several directions. Residents reported seeing the RFCI forces entering the city in "a convoy of 2,000–3,000 people on foot and then dozens of cars without their headlights on." Ouattara declared a three-day curfew in Abidjan from 2100 GMT to 0600 GMT.
The United Nations peacekeepers took control of Abidjan's airport when Gbagbo's forces abandoned it, and Gbagbo's elite forces were reported to be surrounding the presidential residence. United Nations and French forces were also reported to be carrying out protective security operations in the city. The UN peacekeeping mission said its headquarters were fired on by Gbagbo's special forces on 31 March, and returned fire in an exchange lasting about three hours. UN convoys have also come under attack by Gbagbo loyalists four times since 31 March, with three peacekeepers injured in one of the attacks. The peacekeepers had exchanged fire with Gbagbo loyalists in several parts of the city. Around 500 foreign nationals took refuge at the French base at Port-Bouët, near the airport.
Ouattara appealed to Gbagbo's men to lay down their arms, promising that Gbagbo himself would come to no harm, and issued a statement: "There is still time to join your brothers. The country is calling you." Many of them defected or gave up without a fight, including the army chief of staff General Phillippe Mangou, who took refuge in the South African ambassador's house, and the head of the military police, General Tiape Kassarate, who defected to Ouattara's side. Despite belligerent language from Gbagbo's side, most of his forces appear to have decided not to fight – a decision attributed by some commentators to "the historically unwarrior-like nature of the Ivorian army" and the effect of sanctions on Gbagbo's ability to pay his forces. Military sources said that an estimated 50,000 members of the gendarmerie and armed forces had deserted, with only some 2,000 Gbagbo loyalists remaining behind to fight.
The fighting in Abidjan has been concentrated in two areas in the suburb of Cocody – around the state television building, which went off the air on the evening of 31 March, and around the residence of Laurent Gbagbo, where pro-Gbagbo Republican Guard members and armed students were said to be putting up strong resistance. Gunfire and shelling was also reported around the presidential palace in the central Plateau district of the city. Fighting also broke out in the Treichville district, where Gbagbo's Republican Guard was defending the city's main bridges, and around the gendarmerie base at Agban.
On 2 April heavy fighting was around the Agban military base and the presidential palace. State television station RTI appeared to be back under the control of Gbagbo supporters after being briefly taken off air. Many residents of Abidjan reported that supplies of food were becoming limited, with the violence making it dangerous to leave buildings to buy more.
Also on 2 April, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told the BBC that "[a]t this time, I strongly urge Mr Gbagbo to step down and transfer power to the legitimately elected president... Mr Ouattara."
On 4 April, non-military United Nations personnel began to be evacuated from Abidjan and hundreds of additional French troops landed in the Abidjan airport. UN and French helicopters also began firing on pro-Gbagbo military installations, a French military spokesman said the attacks were aimed at heavy artillery and armoured vehicles. Eyewitnesses reported seeing two UN Mi-24P attack helicopters firing missiles at the Akouédo military camp in Abidjan. UN helicopters were flown by Ukrainian Ground Forces crews seconded to the United Nations. The attacks sparked protests by a Gbagbo spokesperson, who said that such actions were "illegal, illegitimate and unacceptable." UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon defended the actions, however, saying that "the [UN] mission has taken this action in self-defence and to protect civilians." He noted that Gbagbo's forces had fired on United Nations patrols and attacked the organization's headquarters in Abidjan "with heavy-caliber sniper fire as well as mortars and rocket-propelled grenades", wounding four peacekeepers.
On 4 April General Phillippe Mangou left the South African ambassador's residence in Abidjan and rejoined the government forces. On Ouattara's TV station, Serges Alla, a journalist claimed: "Mangou was forced to leave the South African embassy because some of his relatives were made hostage by diehard supporters of Gbagbo, and Gbagbo militiamen were putting pressure on him, saying they would bomb his village if he doesn't show himself or doesn't return to the Gbagbo army."
Early on 5 April 2011, Ouattara forces announced that they had captured the presidential palace. The same day General Philippe Mangou, the military chief of Laurent Gbagbo, called for a ceasefire.
Following calls for ceasefire by Gbagbo's military officials, it was reported that fighting has ceased in Abidjan. Special UN representative Choi Young-jin stated that all Gbagbo's top generals had defected and that "the war is over". Gbagbo had been negotiating a surrender; French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said that they were close to convincing Gbagbo to leave power. The ECOWAS bloc promised a "safe and dignified exit" for Gbagbo and his family if he conceded the election, handing power over to Ouattara. However, forces loyal to Ouattara moved to seize Gbagbo at his residence in Abidjan on 6 April 2011, after the negotiations failed.
French forces were said to have destroyed several military vehicles belonging to troops loyal to Laurent Gbagbo during a helicopter-borne mission that rescued Japan's ambassador, Yoshifumi Okamura, during heavy fighting in Abidjan during the morning of 7 April.
On 8 April pro-Ouattara forces continued to besiege Gbagbo in his residence. Ouattara said a blockade had been set up around the perimeter to make the district safe for residents. He said his forces would wait for Gbagbo to run out of food and water. However, Paris-based adviser Toussaint Alain to Gbagbo said that Gbagbo would not surrender. Also on this day, Gbagbo forces using heavy weaponry such as rockets, grenade launchers and tanks were reported to have resumed fighting in Abidjan, taking control of the Plateau and Cocody areas of the city.