Police fire tear gas at protesters in Ivory Coast

Police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of anti-government protesters in eastern Ivory Coast on Monday, paralysing Abengourou city and forcing the world's top cocoa supplier to close several cocoa warehouses.

The demonstrations followed president Laurent Gbagbo's dissolution of the government and electoral commission on Friday in a move almost certain to delay a long-awaited presidential election set for March.

Gbagbo had accused the head of the electoral commission of illegally registering voters loyal to the opposition.

The election, which has been repeatedly postponed since 2005, is badly needed to restore investment in one of the region's top economies, which took a nosedive after a 2002-2003 war split it in two.                                           

"We have decided to protest against Gbagbo's decision to dissolve the government and the electoral commission. It is dictatorship," said Abdoulaye Ba, one of the demonstration leaders in Abengourou.                                           

He said thousands of youths had gathered before riot police fired tear gas canisters to disperse the crowd. Police had tear-gassed about a hundred opposition supporters demonstrating in Abidjan on Saturday.

Rising tensions in West Africa's former economic powerhouse threaten to disrupt a cocoa industry that accounts for about a third of global supply, and could prevent an election the World Bank this month warned is necessary for debt relief.                                           

A World Bank official told Reuters the bank had not yet decided on an official response to Gbagbo's action and its impact on debt cancellation under the heavily indebted poor countries scheme, or HPIC, which was aiming for completion this year.                                           

The official said it might produce one in the next few days.

Debt fallout                 

Besides cocoa and donor debt relief, another casualty of the crisis could be Ivory Coast's commercial debt. The country was due to restructure 2.2 billion euros of defaulted sovereign debt with the London Club by the end of March.                                           

As part of the deal, holders of Brady bonds will be able to exchange such bonds for a new US dollar denominated bond having a term of 23 years and a six-year grace period.                    

Ivory Coast's prime minister Guillaume Soro met with the heads of the UN mission and Gbagbo's party Monday over the country's deepening political crisis. Aides close to him have said he will name a new Cabinet in the coming days.

In New York, the United Nations said in a statement that secretary-general Ban Ki-moon and his special envoy to Ivory Coast, Young-Jin Choi, were monitoring the situation closely and consulting with key political players.

Ban urged the Ivorian people "to remain calm and avoid resorting to any action that could cause renewed violence," the statement said. Ban also called on "political leaders and other national stakeholders to exercise restraint, (and) avoid measures that could return the country to instability."                                               

Opposition anger                                           

Opposition leaders reiterated a call not to recognize Gbagbo, whom they accuse of staging a coup, as president and said they would not accept a new electoral commission.                                          

"The independent electoral commission must be re-established and must become functional again to take us back to where we were," Alphonse Djedje Mady, secretary general of the Ivory Coast Democratic Party, said in a statement.                                           

"We won't wait for another commission of a different form. We want the commission that was there to finish its work."   

Opposition parties have called for massive protests nationwide, raising fears of escalating turmoil.                                           

Cocoa exporters said they feared an interruption in supplies, and London cocoa futures rose on Monday.                                           

After years of delays because of political bickering, some Ivorians are starting to doubt polls will ever take place.   

Rebel commanders who have grown wealthy from smuggling fiefdoms since the end of the civil war appear in no hurry to end the current political stalemate.                                           

A cocoa farmer in Abengourou, Joseph Amani, said by telephone that protests in the city had led most of the warehouse operators to close fearing violence. "Most of the buying stations are closed and people have gone home fearing acts of violence," he said.