The murders with small arms fire which began the day after the proclamation of the Presidential election results of November 28, 2010, has given way to large-scale massacres right out in the open. According to diverse sources (such as the spokesman of Outtara on French TV), there’s already a thousand deaths, tens of thousands of injured and hundreds of thousands of refugees, 300,000 of whom fled the town of Abidjan. Fighting is unfolding in most areas of this town, notably Ababo.

At the time of writing, the tense stand-off in the Ivory Coast, which contained the risk of a direct conflict between former president Gbagbo and the UN troops protecting the (UN’s) officially recognised winner of the elections, Ouattara, has eased somewhat.