Up to one million Ivorians have now fled fighting in the main city Abidjan alone, with others uprooted across the country, the UN refugee agency said on Friday as violence escalated in a four-month power struggle.
France and Nigeria called on world powers to sanction incumbent leader Laurent Gbagbo and his inner circle and ban heavy weapons in Abidjan, days after the United Nations warned that forces loyal to Gbagbo were readying an attack helicopter and powerful rocket launchers.
Gbagbo's camp denies using heavy weapons on civilians. "The massive displacement in Abidjan and elsewhere is being fuelled by fears of all-out war," Melissa Fleming, spokeswoman of the UN refugee agency UNHCR told a news briefing in Geneva.
"Between 700,000 and one million could now be displaced." Ivory Coast has descended to the verge of civil war following a disputed election in November last year which Alassane Ouattara is recognised internationally to have won. Gbagbo has refused to step down, saying the results were rigged.
The violent stand-off has led to 462 confirmed deaths. In Abidjan, a city of 4 million, areas where fighting has occurred were deserted, shops were boarded up or looted and houses abandoned. In other areas, traffic was slow as few dared to venture out. Many restaurants and shops were shut. Roadblocks maned by volatile youths loyal to Gbagbo and armed with guns and machetes have strangled parts of the city.
The UN agency said at least a further 70,000 were known to be displaced in western Ivory Coast several weeks ago, but the refugee agency has been unable to monitor that area due to fighting. Another 100,000 Ivorians had fled to Liberia.
"We are very concerned this conflict could spill into Liberia," said Fleming who just returned from Monrovia with UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres.
The UN human rights office said on Friday it was looking into allegations that 200 nationals of Mali, Burkina Faso, Senegal, Guinea and Togo were killed near Guiglo, in the west. West African immigrants are increasingly under attack after a long hate campaign on state TV equating them with the rebels.
Separately, the UN Human Rights Council agreed on Friday to send an independent commission of inquiry to investigate killings and other serious crimes in the top cocoa producer. Prices have risen dramatically and bus terminals are overcrowded with people desperate to leave. A UN rights officer said on Thursday forces loyal to Gbagbo shelled areas of Abidjan that were seen as pro-Ouattara, and had killed 50 people in the past week.