Ivory Coast, Africa: aid workers find 1,000 bodies in Duekoue

The single biggest atrocity in the long battle for control of Ivory Coast has emerged after aid workers discovered the bodies of up to 1,000 people in the town of Duekoue. Charity workers who reached Duekoue said it appeared that the killings had taken place in a single day, shortly after the town fell to troops loyal to Alassane Ouattara, the man internationally-recognised as having won 2010’s presidential election. The apparent massacre came despite the presence of United Nations troops and - if confirmed - will cast a shadow over Outtara’s assumption of the Ivory Coast’s presidency after a four-month battle to oust Lawrence Gbagbo, the former president who lost the November 2010 election but refused to step down. The International Committee for the Red Cross said its staff discovered more than 800 bodies of people who were clearly local civilians. They were mainly men who had been shot and left where they fell, the organization said, either alone or in small groups dotted around the town, which lies at the heart of Ivory Coast’s economically crucial cocoa producing region. The Catholic charity Caritas, said their team had counted 1,000 bodies, adding that some had been hacked with machetes. The United Nations said that it already logged 430 killed in Duekoue and was still investigating reports of more dead in the town. There are historic tensions between nationalistic Ivory Coast natives and those descended from people seen as foreign settlers, mostly from neighboring African countries, who originated in the north. Gbagbo’s support came from the more nationalistic south while Ouattara is the son of immigrants.