UN council extends Ivory Coast peacekeepers' stay
Source: Reuters
UNITED NATIONS, Jan 10 (Reuters) - The Security Council extended the mandate of U.N. and French peacekeepers in Ivory Coast for six more months on Wednesday and authorized the U.N. troops to help with preparations for long-stalled elections. A resolution adopted unanimously by the 15-nation council authorized the two forces to stay on the job in the troubled West African nation until June 30. Without council action, the mandate would have expired at the end of the day. The previous mandate renewal had been for just one month after the United States said it needed more time to get congressional approval for a longer period. Around 11,000 U.N. and French peacekeepers monitor a buffer zone stretching across the middle of the world's top cocoa growing nation after a 2002-2003 civil war split it into a government-run south and a rebel-held north. Despite a string of U.N.-backed peace deals, Ivory Coast has made little progress toward reuniting or holding elections as the government and rebels bicker over their implementation. The resolution authorized the U.N. mission to help protect the teams running the voter registration process and provide technical assistance to the government and its Electoral Commission as they prepare for the elections, to be held by Oct. 31. It authorized both the U.N. and French forces to help formulate plans for restructuring the country's police and defense forces. The civil war was launched by rebels seeking to drive President Laurent Gbagbo from power. Gbagbo's five-year term, which ran out in 2005, has been extended twice by the Security Council in anticipation of elections. The second extension took place last November as part of a road map empowering Prime Minister Charles Konan Banny to organize the election instead of the president. But Gbagbo has waged a public power struggle with Banny and warned he will not accept aspects of the U.N. plan that violate his constitutional powers.
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