II. Toward Active Conflict: February to mid-March 2011

By the end of January, the country stood on the brink of all-out armed conflict. Primarily through the state-run television station RTI, the Gbagbo government and its most militant followers intensified their incitement to violence against Ouattara supporters and UN personnel. “Foreigners,” which meant northern Ivorians and West African immigrants, were the subject of particularly powerful fear mongering. In addition, a surprise attack in Abobo by a group who called themselves the “Invisible Commandos” resulted in Gbagbo forces losing control of portions of the neighborhood. This combination—xenophobic incitement and the first sign of military threat—led to even greater violence by the Gbagbo militiamen, in particular, who often took to burning alive northern Ivorians and West African immigrants who had the misfortune of crossing the proliferating number of checkpoints. And in one of the defining scenes of Gbagbo’s refusal to give up power, security forces opened fire on women peacefully demonstrating in Abobo, killing seven.

On the other side, the Invisible Commandos were primarily responsible for the abuses documented during this period, including an attack against civilians in a pro-Gbagbo village and extrajudicial executions of captured Gbagbo security forces. The Invisible Commandos were comprised of pro-Ouattara militants, but did not have a clear chain of command to the Ouattara government. The often-identified commander of the Invisible Commandos, IB Coulibaly, was a high-level Forces Nouvelles commander before a violent falling out with Guillaume Soro over control of the rebel group in 2003.[78] In a continuation of the internecine struggle, IB was killed by Soro’s Republican Forces on April 27, 2011. But there was not always a complete distinction between IB’s forces and Soro’s forces as the efforts to remove Gbagbo continued; numerous Abobo residents and sources close to the Forces Nouvelles told Human Rights Watch that some elements under Soro’s ultimate command were in Abobo at this time and likewise implicated them in summary executions.

Pro-Gbagbo Forces

Incitement to Violence by the Gbagbo Camp

Throughout the post-election period, the Gbagbo camp turned the state-owned Radiodiffusion Télévision Ivoirienne into what might be described as a 24-hour-a-day propaganda machine. Human Rights Watch researchers watched many such broadcasts that denounced “foreigners” and the UN and called on Gbagbo supporters to rise up against both. The term “foreigner” was consistently used by pro-Gbagbo militants to signify West African immigrants and ethnic groups from the north. Often such statements came from official government sources. In response to ECOWAS discussions in late December on military intervention, for example, Gbagbo and his spokesman made veiled threats to “risks” for West African immigrants should military intervention take place.[79]

On January 10, the UN Security Council “strongly condemned and demanded an immediate halt to the use of media, especially … RTI, to propagate false information to incite hatred and violence, including against the UN.”[80] Reporters Without Borders said in a January 13 release that journalists who were perceived Ouattara supporters “are being blacklisted” by “the state-owned media, especially Radio-Télévision Ivoirienne (RTI) and the [newspaper] Fraternité Matin”—as both became more inflammatory.[81] On January 19, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Advisers on the Prevention of Genocide and the Responsibility to Protect issued a statement of concern about “continuing hate speech that appears to be aimed at inciting violent attacks against particular ethnic and national groups.”[82]

Inciting language only became more common and more inflammatory. In a February 25 meeting later televised on RTI, Blé Goudé was shown telling his followers:

I give you this order, which must be applied in every neighborhood…. When you go back to your neighborhoods… you must operate checkpoints to monitor the comings and goings in your neighborhoods and denounce every foreigner who enters.[83]

In the same broadcast, a member of the Young Patriots said, “If you are Ivorian, you have to denounce [foreigners] anytime, and if you don’t denounce them, you are a rebel, you are the enemy of Côte d’Ivoire, and you must be treated as such!” And indeed, as discussed in more detail below, Human Rights Watch documented a marked increase in the number of checkpoints—and in the number of targeted attacks, including killings, against these perceived pro-Ouattara groups—in the days immediately following the broadcast. Some witnesses to killings reported the militia making specific reference to Blé Goudé’s order.

Vitriol against pro-Ouattara groups grew further as open fighting began between pro-Ouattara forces and pro-Gbagbo forces. By mid-March, it was often dehumanizing in extreme ways, likening such groups to low forms of animals and encouraging a belief that all Ouattara supporters were “rebels.” In the March 9-15 edition of Le Temps,a paper formerly directed by Gbagbo’s second wife Nadiana Bemba and still close to the Gbagbo regime, a journalist wrote:

Ouattara’s “Blakoros” have decamped like rats in cassava fields, followed by the Burkinabé mercenaries who have been fireproof against our regular forces…. These rebels … in full flight before General Mangou’s men, have infested Abobo like city and field rats, coming in fact from the rebellion’s stinking sewers…. [L]ike hyenas, [Ouattara and French President Sarkozy] giggle and drool at the sight of decaying corpses that are on their macabre menu…. In Abobo, mercenaries, rebels, Licorne and UNOCI wear the same clothes. That is to say, in the sewers of Abobo, nothing is needed to distinguish one vermin from another.[84]

The Associated Press similarly reported that in an RTI broadcast around that time, “the anchorman smiled as he described a dozen alleged rebels killed by pro-Gbagbo soldiers in central Abidjan as ‘culled like little birds.’ Graphic images of their bloodied bodies were interspersed with images of soldiers giving each other high five and cheering crowds.” [85]

On March 18, a day after Gbagbo forces fired mortars into an Abobo marketplace and killed some 25 civilians, Gbagbo spokesman Ahoua Don Mello said on RTI: “His Excellency … Laurent Gbagbo calls on Ivorians to take greater responsibility and for stronger collaboration between citizens and security forces ... so that all suspect presences in our environment can be ‘neutralized.’”[86] The following day, Charles Blé Goudé called on his youth militants to “enroll in the army to liberate Côte d’Ivoire from these bandits.”[87] These two speeches formally mobilized a longstanding reality, placing the long-violent pro-Gbagbo militias central among the regime’s defense efforts. And in so doing, as throughout the crisis, there was no attempt to separate civilians from armed forces as targets. Northerners and West African immigrants, repeatedly dehumanized, were all potential “suspect presences” to be “neutralized”—as the “vermin” did not distinguish from each other. Hundreds more killings followed.

Targeted Violence against West African Immigrants in Abidjan

As tension escalated in February, immigrants from Burkina Faso, Mali, Guinea, Senegal, Niger, and Nigeria, were subjected to a steady and increasingly violent stream of abuses by Gbagbo’s militiamen and security forces. Scores of West African immigrants interviewed by Human Rights Watch said the violence started in late December after ECOWAS recognized Ouattara as president and discussed the possibility of military intervention to remove Gbagbo. However, they said the attacks intensified greatly after the February 24 clashes between the two armed forces in Abobo and the nearby town of Anyama, and the February 25 televised meeting when Blé Goudé called on pro-Gbagbo youth to erect roadblocks and “denounce” foreigners. Human Rights Watch documented the killing of at least 32 West African immigrants and northern Ivorians during this period; 14 were gruesomely beaten or burned to death. In addition, there was widespread looting of shops and houses owned by immigrants as well as the systematic expulsion of West Africans from at least three Abidjan neighborhoods after February 25.

The majority of these attacks took place in the Yopougon, Port Bouët, and Cocody neighborhoods of Abidjan, which all had a heavy presence of pro-Gbagbo militias. Numerous victims said they heard militiamen making reference to Blé Goudé’s “order” while perpetrating abuses. A shopkeeper during a March 1 attack, for example, heard the militiamen say: “Our General [Blé Goudé] has sent us to secure this neighborhood and that means all of you… Mossi [an ethnic group from Burkina Faso], Malians… must get out of this place.”[88] On the day of Blé Goudé’s speech, two Yopougon marketplace porters were tied up, stuffed into their handcarts, and set ablaze.[89] On March 3, a handicapped man from Burkina Faso accused by militiamen of hiding rebels in his house was brought into an abandoned building in Port Bouët and set on fire.[90]

A 21-year-old Malian who was detained with six other men he believed to be West Africans described how five of them were executed at point-blank range by pro-Gbagbo militiamen after being rounded up on March 6 on the streets of Yopougon:

That day I was wearing dirty clothes from working as a porter. That’s how they knew I was Malian—we’re most of the porters. As I was walking, six guys with Kalashes came up behind me, and one of them stuck it into my back and pushed me toward the road. They did the same thing to others, and soon they had seven of us. We were all West African immigrants. They forced us into two taxis, and when we arrived at an unfinished house they forced us down to a basement. There were other guys with Kalashes waiting. It was dark down there, so they used their cell phones for lights to take us down. It smelled horrible…. They beat us with an iron bar and a belt that had a sharp metal buckle. Four of them stood at guard with guns pointed on us at all times. All of them in the basement wore balaclavas. Then they attached black bandanas over the eyes of the first two guys, and one of the Patriots executed them at point-blank range. Another guy was lighting the area for him with a cell phone to make sure he didn’t miss, even though the distance was two meters. They did the same to the next three guys, as they begged for their lives. Five were executed next to me, on their knees. The whole time they kept saying we were rebels, we were rebels. When they tried to put the bandana on my head, I fought back. Every time they tried, I’d fight. So then they beat me again with the iron bar. I kept refusing to let them put the bandana on, as did the guy next to me, a youth from Niger. Eventually I heard them say they would finish us off elsewhere, and they took us outside. They forced the Nigerien guy into a taxi, but I saw another car coming and I took the chance to run for it. They fired two gunshots from behind, but didn’t hit me. I ran and then once I got out of their sight, I found a spot to hide. Eventually I made it back home.[91]

In addition to killings, security forces and militiamen destroyed Ouattara supporters’ homes and businesses. Several Malian and Nigerian shopkeepers who sold petrol, wood, and car parts in a market in Sebroko neighborhood, an area dominated by West African merchants, described how on February 24 members of the Republican Guard arrived to disperse a nearby peaceful demonstration and then opened fire on and threw grenades into their shops, provoking a huge fire that destroyed at least 35. A Malian man described hearing one soldier yell, “Say goodbye to your shops!” before they fired into an area that sold highly flammable items.[92] The witnesses stated that as a group of Malians tried to rescue items from their burning shops, the Republican Guard shot into them, killing two people.[93]

An elderly Malian man who had lived in Yopougon for 35 years described how on February 10, militiamen who operated a checkpoint nearby set his house on fire as he, his three wives, and 15 children slept—forcing them to flee the neighborhood. As they left, the Patriots admonished him never to return, lest they “cut him and his family into pieces.”[94]

Human Rights Watch documented several attacks where militiamen and security forces worked together. A Nigerian shopkeeper described a March 1 attack by CECOS and militiamen in which the attackers burned alive two Nigerien men, one a wood seller and the other a taxi driver wearing traditional Muslim clothing:

After looting and setting six stalls on fire, they returned to the road where they ran into an elder man from Niger who was selling wood. They beat him and took him to a police station saying, “We found a rebel and assassin!” They walked out a few minutes later. The man was screaming, “No, no, I’m a Hausa man from Niger…. I’m not a rebel!” Within a few minutes they had put a tire around his neck, sprayed him with gas and set him alight. It happened right in front of the police station, but they did nothing. A half an hour later they stopped a taxi at their barricade, dragged out a man who we later learned was also from Niger, beat him bitterly, tied both his hands and legs and then one of them cut off his [genitals]. Then they brought a tire and gas and burned him alive…. The whole thing was so fast.[95]

Northern Ivorians were also targeted, as recounted by a witness who watched militiamen burn a northerner alive and slit another man’s throat at a Yopougon checkpoint in late February:

We were attacked and ordered by the Patriots to leave Yopougon…. About 200 of us decided to flee. As we fled, Patriots were screaming, “Go home, you’re all imbeciles. Gbagbo is our president, leave this place or we’ll kill you all.” We left with what we could put in our bags…. From where we lived to the exit of Yopougon were seven checkpoints; they were armed with machetes and wood blocks. At each one, they demanded money and threatened us if we didn’t pay. At around 2 p.m., we reached the last one. They stopped a Dioula[96] man who was about 20 years old and asked for his ID. He was terrified and ran, but the Patriots caught him almost immediately. The youth said, “I have nothing to do with the trouble, I beg you.” Before killing him the Patriots said, “You, you’re a Dioula, you’re the ones bringing war to Côte d’Ivoire.” They beat him with wood and machetes, then one of them took out a big knife, the kind you use to kill a sheep, and cut his throat. This was but two meters away. He started to shake as the life was draining out of him. When I saw the youth killed, I thought they were going to kill my own child as well. It was the only thing I could think of: my son, my son…. The boy’s mother and other family members were there, in the group with us, but they couldn’t say anything. All they could do with all that pain in their hearts was to walk away. After some distance was between them and us, the mother started to cry.[97]

Attacks on Mosques, Muslims, and Imams

At several periods during the crisis, pro-Gbagbo forces, including elite security force units and militias, attacked mosques and specifically targeted imams for execution. Neither former president Gbagbo nor any of his military or civilian leadership publicly denounced these attacks on religious institutions and individuals. In a country split roughly evenly between Muslims and Christians, Ouattara’s political base of northern Ivorian ethnic groups is primarily, though certainly not exclusively, Muslim,[98] while Gbagbo’s supporters and militants were primarily Christian.[99] As with ethnicity, however, religion is closely linked to politics in Côte d’Ivoire, and it is often difficult to disentangle the primary motivation for certain attacks. For the vast majority of Ivorians, there is no inter-religious division or hostility, but as the crisis exploded, the association between Ouattara and Muslim supporters led to a significant number of attacks on Muslim leaders and institutions. Such attacks may well be war crimes under the Rome Statute and customary international humanitarian law.[100]

The first such attacks occurred on December 17. Two mosques in Abobo were hit by rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) during the hour of the main Friday prayer, and another was attacked in Bassam, a coastal town some 20 kilometers from Abidjan.[101] A witness to one of the Abobo attacks told Human Rights Watch:

At around noon, I went to the mosque—the prayer started at 1 p.m., but we usually have a conference which starts an hour earlier. I saw military around and a few cars—one cargo truck and a 4x4. Shortly after arriving, I heard firing from outside. The mosque was attacked with heavy arms. I heard someone yelling, ‘Take position, take position … Fire! Fire!’ like it was a war. Then ‘boom.’ The first RPG passed through the mosque and blew a big hole, near the women’s side, breaking down the wall. Another passed through the mosque itself. The mosque was full of people, we all started running. I heard five booms; I think four [RPGs] hit the mosque. Before the attack they didn’t fire tear gas or yell at us to leave the mosque. After running outside, I saw men in black uniforms firing all around. I ran to my house, which is just across the street, about 10 to 15 meters away. From a window, I saw the armed men capture a 24-year-old RDR supporter and a 24-year-old Burkinabé. As they were running away from the attack, the police trapped and beat them, and then forced them into the cargo truck. It seemed like the police picked them because they were the first young men they came across; they weren’t looking for those two in particular. They beat them until they fell down, kicked them, and then told them to get up. I heard the police yell, ‘We’re going to kill everyone in this neighborhood, you’re all ADO [Ouattara’s initials].” … Their families looked everywhere—hospitals, police stations, the morgues. I go by and see their parents every day; every time we start talking about their sons, they start to cry.[102]

In late February, as tensions mounted with scattered fighting in Abobo and the far west, mosques came under increasing attack by pro-Gbagbo militia. The Associated Press cited at least 10 attacks on mosques from late February through March.[103] On February 25—again a Friday, the Muslim holy day—Human Rights Watch documented three mosques in Yopougon neighborhood that were attacked. One imam said that he received a call the day before the attack, and the caller threatened, “We’re going to burn the mosques because we know you’re hiding arms, and then we’re going to the head imam’s house.”[104] Three 4x4s arrived the following day with masked youth who opened fire inside the mosque and stole or destroyed everything inside. None of the 15 people inside the mosque at the time were hurt, though the attackers threatened repeatedly to kill them.[105]

In Yopougon’s Doukouré area, another mosque was attacked the same day. A 42-year-old who worked at the mosque witnessed its destruction:

The attack started at noon, right after I made the first call to summon people for the Friday prayer. They attacked the outer building, at the entrance into the mosque area, but some neighborhood youth in Doukouré pushed them back. The Gbagbo militia regrouped with reinforcements and came back around 2 p.m. They set fire to the outer building and then broke down the gate…. They entered in a Kia and a truck; others jumped the fence. They set fire in front of the mosque’s main door, fired their guns and heavy weapons at the mosque, and then saw us. They forced us to lay down, put guns to our neck, and searched us. An ONUCI helicopter flew by, and after it left, they started beating us. There were six of them in military uniform, a few with the Republican Guard’s red berets; the rest were Patriots. They forced open the mosque’s door and proceeded to steal or destroy everything. They broke the box where we hold alms and stole the money. Then they used their can of gas and set fire to the Qurans, rugs, and prayer mats. They left around 4 p.m., having taken or broken everything, including the office computers. I saved what I could, but that was a few rugs.[106]

A second witness watched as someone who had been at the mosque when it came under attack was gunned down as he ran away.[107] Residents found the bodies of at least six perceived Ouattara supporters outside the mosque on the street the following day.[108] A Human Rights Watch researcher visited the mosque on March 9; it, and surrounding buildings, had been almost completely destroyed, with the roof collapsing from heavy weapon fire, bullet casings on the floor, burn marks and debris throughout the interior, and burned Qurans collected in a box.

Muslims told Human Rights Watch that it became essentially impossible to wear a boubou—traditional clothing often identified with Muslims in Côte d’Ivoire—in public. Pro-Gbagbo militiamen operating checkpoints would target those in Muslim dress, they said, for being Ouattara supporters. Often, the violence was specifically pointed at imams and other Muslim leaders. Human Rights Watch interviewed a witness to the March 9 targeted abduction by pro-Gbagbo militiamen of an imam and his son in Bloléquin.[109] According to news reports, their bodies appeared on the street the following day, riddled with bullets.[110] Another witness described the March 28 targeted killing by pro-Gbagbo militiamen of a leading imam inside his Duékoué house.[111] The High Council of Imams, of which the deceased imam was a spokesperson in Duékoué, reported that his body and house were then burned.[112] News reports identified additional executions of Muslim religious leaders in Abidjan, including on March 15 in Yopougon and March 19 in Adjamé.[113]

Despite the repeated attacks, Muslim leaders consistently called on followers to avoid allowing the conflict to turn religious, including in a March 18 communiqué.[114] And there were, by comparison, few reported attacks against churches by the Republican Forces. Human Rights Watch received credible information from an international organization about the pillaging of one church in Cocody in mid-April, during which church officials present were threatened for supporting Gbagbo. Human Rights Watch also documented the partial destruction in early May of a Yopougon church where many Gbagbo supporters had taken refuge—though the church damage was described by the witness as incidental to the soldiers’ fighting against who they perceived to be former Gbagbo militiamen among the displaced persons, and not motivated by anti-Christian sentiment.[115]

Targeted Rape and Enforced Disappearances of Ouattara Supporters

After sporadic fighting between Gbagbo’s armed forces and the pro-Ouattara forces started in Abobo on February 24, Gbagbo’s militiamen and security forces together undertook another string of targeted rapes and enforced disappearances. On February 25 alone, Human Rights Watch documented the rape of nine Abobo women by these groups; all victims were active and public members of Ouattara’s political party.

Seven of the women were taken from their houses and raped by one to four men in a building under construction. In all cases, the attackers voiced a clear political motive. A 30-year-old woman, one of three abducted from the same house and later gang raped by militiamen and police, described to Human Rights Watch the February 25 attack:

I live with two other women. We’re well known in our neighborhood for our political work in favor of Alassane [Ouattara]. We often go house to house with booklets laying out his political program, wear ADO t-shirts, participate in marches, and go to [party] meetings. On February 25, on account of the [fighting between armed forces] in our neighborhood, the militiamen put up a roadblock and started rampaging. At around 5 p.m. a group of 10 men with guns banged on our door and burst into our house. Three were in police uniform, and the others were the Young Patriots—we recognized some of them. They said, “We know who you are, we know about your work…. You are on our list.” We had photos of Alassane on the wall, and many of the pamphlets we distribute, which they ripped up in front of us. They forced us at gunpoint into a pickup truck and took us to a building under construction. All of us were raped. Three of them raped me, and one of my sisters was raped by four. While one finished, others were holding me from behind. Then they’d switch…. We were kept there until around 10 the next morning. Our clothes were completely ripped…. As we walked home, a neighbor gave us a cloth to cover ourselves with. Before letting us go they said, “If we hear you’re continuing to do politics, we know where you live and will come after you…. You should know by now, a Dioula [a term often signifying several northern ethnic groups, including Ouattara’s] will never govern Côte d’Ivoire.”[116]

Human Rights Watch documented seven enforced disappearances on February 25 of men from Ouattara’s political party; witnesses implicated members of CECOS as well as pro-Gbagbo militia forces. In two cases, women were raped in front of family members, and the husband and father of the victims were “disappeared.” One young woman described how her father, an official with the local chapter of Ouattara’s party, was detained and later taken away by a group of policemen and militiamen. She told Human Rights Watch that she was raped during the incident.[117] A few witnesses, including a 34-year-old woman whose husband was abducted on February 25, described armed men coming to their door with a list on which the name of their family member appeared:

At 8 p.m., three men in civilian clothing knocked at our door. I answered the door and asked what the problem was. They ordered me to get my husband, who was sleeping in our bedroom. I tried to be calm and asked them who they were and why they had come. One of them took out a card on which I read CECOS. They said we were organizing the campaign of Alassane there. It was true, we are very active in the RHDP, but of course I didn’t say that…. They took out a list and said my husband’s name was there. They had pushed their way through the door by now. I was crying, “Please don’t take my husband…. He’s not in politics, he’s a simple driver. Don’t take him, my children are young.” One of them pointed his pistol at my husband and told him to come. I was sobbing; my husband asked me to calm down.

One of them slapped my face, ripped off my underclothes and held me down on the sofa. My husband screamed, “Leave my wife. I beg you, leave her.” They said, “Shut up, we can do whatever we want.” They said they were going to kill all the Dioula who’re working for Alassane, that we were rebels. After [raping] me, they dragged my husband outside and took him away in one of their (CECOS) cars. I call him on his mobile again and again, but he doesn’t answer.[118]

Another RHDP leader from the Riviera Palmière neighborhood was abducted on February 10 by three armed men dressed in green camouflage uniforms. A witness heard one of the armed men saying, “It’s you who’s behind Alassane, we were sent to find you,” and described how the armed men fired in the air when a group of people moved toward the car to try to free the victim.[119]

Violent Suppression of Demonstrations

Gbagbo’s security forces continued their pattern of violently suppressing demonstrations during this period, with Human Rights Watch documenting the killing of 25 protesters between February 21 and March 8. Scores more were seriously injured, with documented use of live rounds, fragmentation grenades, rocket-propelled grenades, and an unidentified weapon fired from a tank.

On February 21 in Koumassi, three witnesses told Human Rights Watch that security forces fired at least two RPGs directly into a crowd of over 100 demonstrators, killing at least four and wounding several others. The witnesses said that security forces, including CECOS, also fired live rounds and tossed fragmentation grenades into the crowd.[120] One demonstrator said: “First they shot at us, and then they fired rockets directly into the crowd. I saw several dead, including one Malian man whose arm was completely severed. His intestines were completely outside his body.”[121]

In Treichville, around 9 a.m. the same day, troops from the Republican Guard arrived in a convoy of cargo trucks and opened fire on demonstrators congregated at the intersections of Avenue 16 and Rues 17 and 21. One witness told Human Rights Watch, “They came and opened fire with live ammunition immediately. A youth not far from me took a gunshot straight to his head; it was as if part of his face was blown off. He was one of at least two killed that I saw with my own eyes.”[122]

On March 3, in an event that ultimately defined the brutality of Gbagbo’s attempt to cling to power, security forces killed seven women who were demonstrating peacefully with thousands of other women in Abobo neighborhood. As the women reached where they had planned to assemble, a green pickup with a mounted machine gun, a police cargo truck, a green military camouflage tank, and a blue gendarme tank passed by. Three witnesses told Human Rights Watch that the tank fired a heavy weapon. Almost simultaneously, someone in green fatigues with a military helmet opened fire with a machine gun mounted on the back of a pickup.[123] A doctor who treated several women who later died said that their wounds were clearly caused by heavy weaponry, not bullets.[124] The doctor, as well as two witnesses at the scene, told Human Rights Watch that the head of one victim had been completely separated from her body.[125] Other victims, including both deceased and seriously injured, had bullet wounds from the mounted machine gun.[126]

Human Rights Watch also documented seven deaths between March 4 and 15 in Abobo from stray bullets during indiscriminate strafing by Gbagbo’s security forces. More than a dozen Abobo residents described how security forces drove quickly through territory controlled by pro-Ouattara forces several times every day, firing Kalashnikovs in every direction—sometimes in the air, other times toward people on the streets. The daily attacks ultimately led to the massive internal displacement of people from Abobo.

A doctor from one Abobo hospital told Human Rights Watch that he had performed surgery on 108 people between February 28 and March 8 related to the post-election violence, all but four involving wounds from bullets or heavy weaponry fired by Gbagbo’s security forces. The doctor was unable to clarify how many of the wounded were civilians.[127]

Pro-Ouattara Forces

Civilian Killings in Anonkoua Village

Around 2 a.m. on March 7, more than 60 pro-Ouattara fighters attacked the village of Anonkoua-Kouté, located just outside their Abidjan military stronghold in Abobo. Anonkoua is a village of predominantly Ebrié people, who largely supported Gbagbo. Human Rights Watch believes, based on interviews with witnesses and neighborhood residents, that the attackers were from the Invisible Commandos. Witnesses described the attackers descending upon Anonkoua from Abobo PK-18, which was the base of the Invisible Commandos from late February through late April. As detailed above, the Invisible Commandos fought against Gbagbo but were likely outside Ouattara and Soro’s chain of command; IB Coulibaly, a longtime rival of Soro killed on April 27 during internecine fighting after Gbagbo’s arrest, was widely believed to be their commander.[128]

On March 6, there had been combat in the area between Gbagbo forces and the Invisible Commandos. Victims of the March 7 attack as well as a fighter from the Invisible Commandos told Human Rights Watch that pro-Ouattara forces acted out of concern that weapons had been left in the village by pro-Gbagbo forces.[129] However, the attackers appear to have killed civilians at random and burned down much of the village, rather than search for weapons. Human Rights Watch interviewed four victims from Anonkoua-Kouté and confirmed the death of nine civilians, including two women who were burned to death. One 28-year-old victim told Human Rights Watch:

I could hear machine gun fire, and people from the village started crying out. I went out to see what was happening, and I came across someone who grabbed me and demanded a password. I didn’t know it, so he pointed his sawed-off shotgun at me from two meters away and fired. I swung my arm at the gun as he was firing, and buckshot sprayed into my arm and neck. I fell to the ground, and lay there as if I was dead. I watched them massacre the village as I lay there…. The rebels were dressed in all black. Some wore Balaclavas, others had on bandanas. They pounded on people’s doors and kept saying, “We’re here for war, we’re not here to play,” and demanded where people were hiding arms as they beat and killed them. At one house close to mine, a woman refused to open the door. They threw in lit bottles that had been soaked in gas, and the house went up in flames. A woman on fire come running out, screaming. She died later that day. I watched as they grabbed another of my neighbors and shot him at point-blank range. It was all barbaric.[130]

Another witness described watching pro-Ouattara forces slit the throat of his 72-year-old father.[131] At least 15 houses were burned according to multiple residents, and the entire village was abandoned.

In addition, pro-Ouattara forces—believed by witnesses, victims, and neighborhood residents to be a combination of IB Coulibaly’s Invisible Commandos and Forces Nouvelles fighters loyal to Soro, depending on the specific attack’s location—threatened and displaced perceived Gbagbo supporters throughout Abobo and Anyama. On March 8, a member of the Bété ethnic group said pro-Ouattara soldiers broke down his door in Abobo and ransacked his house. They pointed guns at him and said he was a “Patriot,” threatening to kill him. Neighbors intervened on his behalf, which the victim believed saved his life, but the attackers stole all his possessions.[132] The victim, like thousands of others, fled to an area still under Gbagbo’s control.

Summary Executions of Detained Gbagbo Fighters

Human Rights Watch documented the summary execution of 11 armed forces and militia members loyal to Gbagbo between March 1 and 10. In seven cases, witnesses described how pro-Ouattara forces stopped vehicles or individuals on foot at checkpoints in Abobo to search for weapons. When pro-Ouattara fighters found a weapon and “judged” the person to be a Gbagbo combatant, they killed the disarmed detainee. Human Rights Watch believes the perpetrators to be a combination of the Coulibaly’s and Soro’s fighters, at times working with youth militiamen from the local population. The former Forces Nouvelles spokesperson denied that Soro’s forces were in Abobo at this time.[133]

One pro-Ouattara combatant in Abobo—who identified himself as part of the Invisible Commandos—described four cases to Human Rights Watch in which he had been part of this kind of operation. On March 2, an ambulance was stopped and his fellow-combatants said they had discovered Kalashnikovs during the search; the driver was then detained. On March 5, the pro-Ouattara fighter said he found three people with arms passing a checkpoint on foot near the Abobo sub-neighborhood of Anonkoua. In both cases, the pro-Ouattara fighter said he brought the detainees to a higher-level commander, indicating organization and a clear chain of command. After being detained, the person was subject to an “intense interrogation,” then “neutralized,” the fighter said.[134]

A witness to the execution of another three people believed to be loyal to Gbagbo told Human Rights Watch:

On Monday, March 6, I was walking through Abobo when a black 4x4 came across a checkpoint. The Forces Nouvelles[135] there stopped the car and searched it. They found three Kalashes as well as security force uniforms…. The FN guys held up the Kalashes, and immediately ten more FN descended on the car. They grabbed the three people who were inside and threw them to the ground, beating them with long blocks of wood and the guns they’d just captured. They ripped off their clothes and as some of them were still beating them, others grabbed tires and lay them on top. The FN guys then poured gasoline from a container, and lit it all on fire. You could see the movement of the Gbagbo guys’ legs as they burned, still being beaten by the FN soldiers.[136]

In another incident on March 7, pro-Ouattara forces detained four alleged militia leaders in Abobo and summarily executed them. Credible accounts indicated that two people were captured and then used to lay a trap for higher-level leaders, before the pro-Ouattara forces executed all of them.[137] Human Rights Watch was shown video images of the body of “Lamté,” a neighborhood militia leader implicated in post-election killings against Ouattara supporters. His throat had been cut completely. In the video, another victim was seen to be impaled with a stake.