Ivory Coast: Ouattara forces surround Gbagbo

Forces loyal to the internationally-recognized president-elect, Alassane Ouattara, seized the presidential residence earlier Tuesday, following a major push prepared by French and UN airstrikes against the last remaining weapons depots and defensive positions of incumbent Laurent Gbagbo. It was then that Gbagbo began attempts to negotiate a surrender with whatever concessions he might be able to obtain. The special representative of UN Secretary Ban ki-Moon in Ivory Coast, YJ Choi says the bulk of the fighting seems now to be over, though the city of Abidjan remains in a state of confusion and disarray. Even before the outbreak of major hostilities, postelection violence claimed hundreds of lives - most of them Ouattara supporters – and drove as many as 1 million people from their homes.

Ivory Coast gained independence from France in 1960, and some 20,000 French citizens still lived there when a brief but intense civil war erupted in the early part of the last decade, which in 2003 resulted in a ceasefire monitored by French forces under a UN mandate and a shaky national unity government with Gbagbo at its head. Following four months of attempts to negotiate Gbagbo's departure, the U.N. Security Council unanimously passed a resolution giving the 12,000-strong peacekeeping operation the right: “to use all necessary means to carry out its mandate to protect civilians under imminent threat of physical violence ... including to prevent the use of heavy weapons against the civilian population.”

Listen to Chris Altieri's report: