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![]() A senior Ivory Coast police official said Sunday he saw French troops fire "directly" at unarmed demonstrators during an anti-French rally earlier this month. Colonel Georges Guiai Bi Poin said he was in charge of about 60 gendarmes outside the Hotel Ivoire to prevent demonstrators from storming the building. He told AFP: "French troops fired directly into the crowd. They opened fire on the orders of their chief Colonel D'Estremon. Without warning." Guiai Bi Poin said he was at the French colonel's side in the hotel lobby throughout the night. Almost three weeks after the incident it still remains unclear what exactly happened during the protest and how many people died and were wounded. Ivorian authorities have said that 57 civilians were killed and that more than 2,200 people were wounded between November 6 and 10, including an unconfirmed number by French troops, but they never released a toll of the specific Hotel Ivoire incident which took place on November 9. Followers of President Laurent Gbagbo accused French soldiers, including snipers hidden in the hotel, of firing on "Young Patriot" Gbagbo loyalists. Until now, French Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie has insisted that the victims, including an Ivorian gendarme, were killed in clashes between the Young Patriots and Ivory Coast police. The French military says only that shots were fired in the air as warning and "intimidation." But Alliot-Marie told RTL radio Sunday, without specifically referring to the Hotel Ivoire incident, that some casualties may have been caused by French troops during the demonstrations. "They were forced to shoot," she said. "They carried out warning shots and, in a few cases, were forced to make full use of their firearms. There was no way of avoiding it." "There were doubtless a few victims; we don't know for certain because when things take place by night it is very difficult to know what is going on. "There were also a great number of victims inside the crowds, killed by the crush and also from a number of stray bullets," she said. She insisted that French troops had shown admirable "self-control and restraint" in "abominable circumstances, faced with a crowd armed with Kalachnikov rifles and guns." Guiai Bi Poin said the crowd at the Hotel Ivoire was yelling insults but was unarmed and did not shoot. "Not one of my men fired a shot," he said. "There were no shots from the crowd. None of the demonstrators was armed -- not even with sticks, or knives or rocks." He said that when he reported to the French commander on the day of the riot, he was told: "Colonel, my barbed wire has been crossed, and the crowd is getting excited. If they do not let us leave within 20 minutes, I am going to shoot." The Ivorian officer said he negotiated with two or three of the protestors who refused to let the French troops return to their base, saying instead they should move to a nearby hotel. He said there were "insults, and hostile slogans, but we had no interest in firing on the crowd. I hardly left Colonel D'Estremon's side at all. We co-managed the situation between us. I told him to wait -- that we had to go to the end in seeking a negotiated solution before giving orders to do anything else." "Suddenly," said Guiai Bi Poin, "there was a movement on our left and my gendarmes were pushed violently by the crowd. They fell back a meter or two. D'Estremon then said to me, 'Colonel, the red line has been crossed. I am going to open fire. FIRE!'" The officer said the French troops began shooting. "It was not a haphazard fusillade. It was carried out on the orders of their chief. And there was no warning." "I saw his men firing directly at demonstrators less than 10 meters away. There was nothing equivocal. Everything was clear. The entire detachment was shooting, more than 30 soldiers." Guiai Bi Poin said he yelled at the French officer to fire in the air, to aim higher, "He did this but some of his men did not obey and some continued to fire on the crowd. I saw lots of people falling, but I do not know how many victims there were." All rights reserved. © 2004 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.
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