Ivory Coast Defence Minister Moise Lida Kouassi vowed on Saturday that the government would launch a broad offensive very soon against rebels who staged an uprising in the west African country and now control two towns.
”I can assure you that we are now going to move to the fast lane … the general offensive will start very soon,” he said on national television.
Mutinous soldiers were on Saturday making a determined bid to wrest yet another town in Ivory Coast and said the fall of Tiebissou, near the country’s capital Yamoussoukro, was a matter of hours.
The well-planned mutiny broke out in Ivory Coast’s commercial capital Abidjan, the central town of Bouake and Korhogo in the north on September 19. It was quashed in Abidjan on the first day but the rebels still hold the two other towns.
”We are going to launch mobile warfare across the entire territory — we have the numbers on our side and we have started to receive weapons with a capability superior to that of the rebels,” Kouassi added.
According to a rebel representative in Bouake, the mutiny, officially termed a coup bid, was organised by Ivorian military forces in exile. – Sapa-AFP