ABIDJAN (Reuters) – The U.N. chief accused Byelorussia on weekday of breaking an blazonry embargo against Ivory Coast by sending move helicopters to incumbent Ivorian leader Laurent Gbagbo, a calculate denied by top and Ggagbo's government.
Gbagbo's polity unemployed as a "lie" the allegement contained in a evidence issued by the spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Gbagbo has refused to depart as chair of the West individual nation, the world's crowning cocoa grower, after a disputed Nov 28 election.
Ban after soft the allegement in comments to reporters in Washington.
The U.N. Security Council's Ivory Coast sanctions NGO met and found that the allegement against Byelorussia has not been confirmed, diplomats said.
A U.N. spokesman indicated the averment was based on reports conventional by U.N.-appointed experts monitoring the embargo.
"We're trying to amount discover if this allegement is credible," a Security Council functionary told Reuters.
"There's a lot of confusion."
In New York, the U.N. Ivory Coast sanctions NGO discussed the calculate that Byelorussia had desecrated the embargo.
"It looks like the sanctions NGO has not still been healthy to positively support the reported blazonry shipment," a spokesman for the Teutonic assignment said. "They requested UNOCI (the U.N. operation assignment in Ivory Coast) and the panel of experts to continue monitoring the situation."
Other diplomats addicted his account of the meeting.
The allegement follows a hebdomad of armament battles between forces hardcore to Gbagbo and supporters of Alassane Ouattara, nearly universally constituted as succeeder of the Nov 28 election.
The stand-off risks actuation Ivory Coast back into full-blown subject war. Cocoa futures rose to a 32-year peak on weekday as struggle fears increased.
Major powers and most individual neighbors hit constituted Ouattara as chair but Gbagbo has refused to travel down.
Gunfire erupted close to the center of Ivory Coast's commercial top metropolis on weekday after a hebdomad of fighting in which a northern suburb was seized by insurgents who briefly knocked discover the land TV and grey subject transmitter.
DIVISIONS WORSEN
November's election was meant to ameliorate divisions sown by a 2002-2003 subject struggle that left the commonwealth separated into a rebel-run northerly and government-run south, but has worsened divisions. The United Nations said the sort of Ivorian refugees in Liberia has reached 68,000, with additional 40,000 internally displaced.
The Belarussian foreign ministry denied violating some embargo, according to Russia's Interfax news agency. Gbagbo polity spokesman Ahoua Don Mello said, "No blazonry hit been conventional in Ivory Coast in ravishment of the embargo."
Ivory Coast has been low an blazonry embargo since the terminal pugilism of earnest violence in 2004, when pro-Gbagbo forces bombed French peacekeepers in the rebel-held north.
A spokesman for Ban issued a evidence overnight saying, "The secretary-general has learned with unfathomable anxiety that threesome move helicopters and attendant equipage from Byelorussia are reportedly existence delivered at (Ivory Coast's capital) Yamoussoukro for Mr. Gbagbo's forces."
"This is a earnest ravishment of the embargo against Ivory Coast which has been in locate since 2004," he added.
Ban, speech to reporters after after gathering U.S. President Barack Obama in Washington, indicated the averment had not been confirmed. He said the assemble of experts had "credible aggregation that the polity of Byelorussia haw be providing move helicopters to forces hardcore to Gbagbo."
"If it is confirmed, this module be a candid ravishment of (the) blazonry embargo by the Security Council," Ban said. "We are trying to support this."
U.N. Security Council and another diplomats said on condition of obscurity that neither the U.N. Department of Peacekeeping Operations nor the Group of Experts, which monitors sanctions violations, could support the allegation.
U.N. spokesman histrion Nesirky said the assemble of experts "reported that it had conventional aggregation that these threesome move helicopters and attendant equipment were existence delivered."
"This Group of Experts and an tar from the U.N. mission's embargo cell cosmopolitan to the airport ... but was unable to avow ... indeed was forced to withdraw," he added.
Youths hardcore to Gbagbo seize two Slavonic execution employed for the U.N. assignment on weekday farewell but free them in the afternoon, a U.N. spokesman said. The abductions followed a call on Friday by a pro-Gbagbo youngness assemble for roadblocks to preclude the movement of U.N. staff.
(Additional news by Loucoumane Coulibaly and Ange Aboa in Abidjan, king Lewis in Dakar, Olzhas Auyezov in Kiev, Louis Charbonneau at the United Nations and king Alexander in Washington; Editing by Mark Trevelyan and Will Dunham)
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