UN Renews Cote D'ivoire Diamond, Travel Sanctions

Security Council renews diamond and travel sanctions on Côte d'Ivoire

The United Nations Security Council today renewed for another year a ban on diamonds and arms trade with Côte d'Ivoire as well as targeted sanctions restricting the travel of individuals.

By its unanimously adopted resolution today, the Council said it would review these measures once the parties have fully implemented the Ouagadougou political agreement which brokered an end to the conflict that had divided Côte d'Ivoire between a rebel-held north and Government-controlled south since 2002; and after the holding of open, free, fair and transparent presidential and legislative elections.

The Council reiterated its demand that all Ivorian parties provide unhindered access to the Group of Experts established to monitor sanctions against the country, and extended the mandate of that group for another year. It urged all the Ivorian parties to collaborate more actively with the Group of Experts and to provide it with the information and documentation it requests.

The Secretary-General was asked to communicate to the Security Council, through its sanctions committee, information gathered by the UN Mission in Côte d'Ivoire (UNOCI) and, where possible, reviewed by the Group of Experts, concerning the supply of arms and related materiel to the country.

The Council stressed that it is ready to impose targeted measures against persons who are determined to be a threat to the peace and national reconciliation process in Côte d'Ivoire as well as others undermining peace and threatening human rights there.

The move came despite an appeal by the President of Côte d'Ivoire, Laurent Gbagbo, who in September called for a partial lifting of the weapons embargo so that the country can "carry out its task of protecting people and goods."

He told the General Assembly on 26 September that sanctions remain on individuals who have "put heart and soul into seeking peace," and asked the UN to lift those measures as they applied to three individuals: Charles Goudé Ble, Eugène Djue and Kouakou Fofie.

ENDS

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