COTE D IVOIRE: French journalist shot dead by policeman
ABIDJAN, 22 October (IRIN) - Jean Helene, the correspondent of Radio
France Internationale (RFI) in Cote d'Ivoire, was shot dead by a
policeman on Tuesday night while he was waiting outside police headquarters
in
Abidjan to interview 11 political detainees who were about to be
released, a French embassy spokesman said.
The spokesman quoted eyewitnesses as saying that Helene, 48, was
sitting in his car and talking on his mobile phone when the policeman
approached him. The French journalist got out of the car and the policeman
rammed the butt of his automatic rifle into the man's stomach before
shooting him in the back of the head, he added.
Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo, Internal Security Minister Martin
Bleou and the French ambassador Gildas Le-Lidec immediately went to the
scene. Bleou said later that a police sargent had been arrested in
connection with the killing and a full investigation was under way.
"We are determined to take all the measures which the circumstances of
this affair demand," he added.
French President Jacques Chirac, who began a four-day visit to Niger
and Mali on Wednesday, deplored the killing and demanded that the Ivorian
authorities "shed all possible light on this murder."
The press freedom watchdog Reporters Sans Frontieres (RSF), which
criticised the recent erosion of press freedom in Cote d'Ivoire earlier this
week, condemned the killing and demanded a full inquiry. RSF Secretary
General Robert Menard said: "Exemplary punishment must be meted out to
those responsible for the murder of the journalist."
The French embassy spokesman said it was not yet clear whether the
killing was premeditated, but early indications were that it was not.
The murder of Helene, a veteran reporter of conflicts in Africa, was
the latest in series of anti-French incidents since Cote d'Ivoire erupted
into cvil war in September last year.
French companies still control much of the economy of this once
prosperous country, which is the world's largest cocoa exporter, and 4,000
French peackeeping troops have been deployed to keep the two sides apart.
But leading figures in President Gbagbo's Ivorian Popular Front (FPI)
have repeatedly accused the former colonial power of siding with rebels
who occupy the northern half of Cote d'Ivoire.
There has been a strident anti-French campaign in pro-Gbagbo sections
of the Ivorian media and symbols of French influence in this former
French colony have repeatedly been attacked by Gbagbo supporters in
Abidjan.
The French lycee in Abidjan was burned down on 25 January the day after
the signing of French-brokered peace agreement with the rebels. And
earlier this month, hardline youth groups vandalised the offices of
French-owned water, electricity and mobile phone companies in Abidjan as
they
demonstrated against the rebels refusal to disarm,.
Last April, the rebels appointed nine ministers to serve in a
broad-based government of national reconciliation and a ceasefire has held
firm
since then. But on 23 September the rebels suspended their
participation in the peace process in protest at what they said was the refusal
of
Gbagbo to delegate meaningful authority to individual ministers.
The rebels withdrew from the cabinet and put on hold plans to disarm.
Ghanaian President John Kufuor is currently leading diplomatic efforts
to break the deadlock and put the peace process back on track before
Cote d'Ivoire degenerates into renewed conflict. Diplomatic sources said
he was attempting to arrange a reconciliation summit between Gbagbo and
rebel leaders in Accra.
The eleven detainees who Helene was waiting to interview were all
activists of the Rally of Republicans (RDR) party of exiled former prime
minister Alasanne Ouattara, who was banned from standing against Gbagbo in
the 2000 presidential election.>
They were arrested last Friday for questioning about an alleged plot to
assassinate various unnamed political and military leaders, but were
released on Tuesday night shortly after Helene's shooting.
An activist of the Democratic Party of Cote d'Ivoire (PDCI), which held
power from independence in 1960 until 1999, remained in custody, PDCI
Secretary General Alphonse Djedje Mady told IRIN on Wednesday. The
man,
whose arrest last Thursday has not yet been acknowledged by the
government, was being held at a base of the paramilitary gendarmerie, he
added.
Rebel spokesman Amadou Kone expressed regret at the killing of Helene,
saying that his reporting of the arrest of the 11 RDR activists had
helped to secure their eventual release. The RDR is sympathetic to the
rebels and has been accused by Gbagbo of colluding with them.
Kone told IRIN by telephone from the rebel capital Bouake in central
Cote d'Ivoire that rebel leaders had received several diplomatic
approaches urging them to make up their quarrel with Gbagbo and were
responding
positively to these overtures.
"We have received several invitations, which we are going to accept
because we are open to discussion about resuming our place in the
government of national reconciliation," Kone said.
Helene was not the first French national to die in the Ivorian
conflict. On 25 August, two French peacekeepers were shot dead by rebel
fighters after an argument during which a French patrol tried to persuade the
armed fighters to leave the demilitarised zone along the frontline
between rebel and government territory.