A number of thousand flee the Ivory Coast for concern of violence after the election, says the UN
Hundreds of individuals have fled to neighboring West African international locations from Côte d’Ivoire for concern of extra violence following a presidential election there marred by lethal unrest, the United Nations Excessive Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) stated on Tuesday.
The UN refugee company warned that violence and tensions surrounding Saturday’s elections, which led President Alassane Ouattara right into a controversial third time period, had prompted greater than 3,200 individuals to hunt refuge throughout borders in Liberia, Ghana and Togo.
“A lot of the arrivals are girls and kids from the western and southwestern areas of the Ivory Coast,” UNHCR spokesman Boris Cheshirkov advised reporters. “Many report concern of getting caught up within the escalating violence.”
A number of the new arrivals had been former Ivorian refugees who had just lately returned to their nation however had been pressured to flee once more, he stated.
The UNHCR has referred to as on Ivorian political leaders and opinion leaders to chorus from “calling for violence, resorting to hate speech and resolving any disputes peacefully and thru dialogue,” Cheshirkov stated.
His feedback got here as Ivorian election officers on Tuesday confirmed Ouattara’s victory within the election, saying he had received 94% of the vote.
The landslide end result had been broadly anticipated after two main opposition leaders demanded a boycott of the vote and a civil disobedience marketing campaign.
The gap plunges Francophone West Africa’s finest economic system deeper right into a disaster that erupted in August when Ouattara stated he would run for a 3rd time period and anger the opposition, which accused him of finishing up an “election coup”.
Pre-election clashes have killed no less than 30 individuals and anti-Ouattara protests have raised fears of a repeat of a disaster a decade in the past during which 3,000 individuals died in preventing after then-President Laurent Gbagbo refused to simply accept Ouattara’s defeat.
Cheshirkov stated greater than 2,600 Ivorian refugees had arrived in Liberia for the reason that vote, 1,000 of whom arrived on the final day alone.
The brand new refugees are hosted in native communities, however the UNHCR stated they had been deploying extra workers to extend their response and dealing with Liberian authorities to register new arrivals and supply them with meals.
In the meantime, about 600 refugees arrived in Ghana, primarily from the town of Niable, which is lower than 5 kilometers from the border.
“They expressed their intention to remain near the border in an effort to return shortly when the violence subsides,” Cheshirkov stated.
Most of them now reside in Ampain refugee camps, however as of Monday, almost 300 had already determined to cross again throughout the border and return to Niable, after listening to from their households that the state of affairs had calmed down, he stated.
