Three killed in Ivory Coast clashes between ex-rebels and police

Three people were killed when police clashed Tuesday with former rebels who had blocked the road into Bouake, Ivory Coast’s second biggest city, to demand government compensation payments, an AFP reporter said.

Three bloodied bodies were brought into the main Bouake hospital, the reporter said, shortly after police in the morning stepped in to clear the protesters who had blocked off the southern road into Bouake on Monday.

The trouble in the world’s top cocoa producer comes days after a crippling four-day army mutiny staged by other former rebels who joined the army in 2011, when peace returned after a decade of violence that had split the country in two.

Those mutineers ended their protests and returned to barracks last week after reaching an agreement with the government in a pay dispute.

But other former rebels who disarmed and did not join the army are now demanding identical compensation payments from the government.

Of the around 8,400 rebels involved in the Ivorian war, some 2,000 have joined the nation’s armed forces.