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United Nations and French helicopter gunships have launched a joint attack on the residence of Ivory Coast strongman Laurent Gbagbo, as they move to "neutralise" his heavy weapons cache after a week of intense fighting.
Ban Ki-moon, the UN Secretary General, said he had ordered peacekeepers to use “all necessary means” to stop the Gbagbo forces’ heavy weapons.
Four French gazelle attack helicopters accompanied by two United Nations MI24 gunships, known as "Hinds", took off from the French military base just after 5pm local time (6pm UK time).
The staccato sound of their gunfire rang out over Abidjan, accompanied by loud explosions as the helicopters fired their rockets into Mr Gbagbo's gated compound. A spokesman for Mr Gbagbo said his residence had been "partially destroyed" by the missiles, although he declined to say whether Mr Gbagbo was at the residence at the time.
Hamadoun Toure, the UN's spokesman in Ivory Coast, said that despite a previous attack by airborne forces on Monday, Mr Gbagbo was still using his heavy weapons on civilians.
"We will do whatever is necessary to neutralise the heavy weapons," he said. "They have been using them against civilians near our headquarters again, they attacked the Golf Hotel (where president elect Alassane Ouattara is based) and as we speak, they are firing on our base at the UN.
"We are not only targeting the presidential residence but the presidential palace and military camps where heavy weapons have been identified."
The action came just hours after lawyers for Alasanne Ouattara, who is internationally-recognised to have won November's election, called for further action from their international allies amid concerns that Mr Gbagbo's troops had made considerable advances. They said that the international community had a duty to help remove the "illegal occupation force" of Mr Gbagbo.
On Friday, the UN admitted that despite a final assault to bring the 65-year-old strongman out of his bunker in his residence in Cocody, an upmarket suburb in Abidjan, Mr Ouattara's camp had lost control of both that region and Plateau, the area which is home to his palace.
Mr Gbagbo's soldiers then on Saturday fired mortars on the luxury Golf Hotel complex where Mr Ouattara and his advisers have been since before the disputed elections – a claim denied by both sides but confirmed by troops at the scene.
Mr Ouattara's camp has insisted that it is not losing ground to Mr Gbagbo's forces. Over the weekend, UN and French troops were keen to show Abidjan's newly secured port area – one of the most important assets of the world's top cocoa producer – as well as Air France planes taking off from the French-run airport.
Mr Ouattara's lawyers said more robust intervention by UN and French forces was in line with "the spirit and the letter" of UN Security Council Resolution 1975 adopted last month and would help to speed the West African country's transition to democracy.
The UN has 9,000 troops in Ivory Coast and last week led an operation to destroy Mr Gbagbo's weapons caches with an aerial bombardment.
But Mr Toure indicated recently that it was still seeking a negotiated end to a stand-off in which at least 1,500 people have died and 100,000 have fled the country.
Human Rights Watch meanwhile reported yesterday that forces loyal to Mr Ouattara had killed hundreds of civilians, raped his rival's supporters and burned villages during the offensive.
France has 1,700 troops based in its former colony. At present it is mostly evacuating and protecting foreign citizens but it was involved in Monday's operation and has taken defensive action when attacked during the course of its duties.
Among the French troops in the country are special forces and foreign legion units, who say privately that if the political will was there, they could remove Mr Gbagbo within days.
But a diplomatic source said that because of its fraught history in the country, and its commitments in Libya and Afghanistan, it is reluctant to get more involved.
"It might support and make suggestions, perhaps even be the hand in glove by offering some training to the (Mr Ouattara's Republican forces) but could not be seen to be taking its own military action," he said. He added that part of the reason for the reversals in fortunes were that both sides are prone to exaggeration, meaning they are often seen to lose ground they never entirely held.
There are also fears that Mr Gbagbo could be using his residence's position on the unsecured lagoon which dominates Ivory Coast's economic capital to replenish his weapons stocks by having them brought in over the water.
Apollinaire Yapi, a spokesman for Mr Ouattara's Prime Minister Guillaume Soro, said his heavy weapons were what were allowing his outnumbered forces to hold on.
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