U.N., international monitors pull out of Ivory Coast election

On Thursday, military leader Gen. Robert Guei delivered his first campaign speech

ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP) -- The United Nations and other international bodies have withdrawn observer teams days before Ivory Coast's elections to protest the exclusion of major candidates, officials said Tuesday.

In New York, U.N. associate spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the world body would no longer "provide coordination of international observers for the election in the Ivory Coast."

Dujarric added, however, that the United Nations would continue to provide "technical assistance" to Ivory Coast's national electoral commission in order to help build know-how to run elections democratically.

The European Union and Canada were also withdrawing teams of observers, members of the teams said on condition of anonymity.

Dujarric pointed out that U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan had registered "regret that in light of the decision of the Supreme Court of Ivory Coast ... many candidates nominated by some major political parties have been excluded from running for president."

The EU and the United States earlier expressed similar condemnation and have withdrawn funding for the elections. France, Ivory Coast's former colonial ruler, has also criticized the vote.

The elections pit Gen. Robert Guei, who took power in a December 24 military coup, against four other candidates.

The Supreme Court excluded Ivory Coast's main opposition leader, Alassane Dramane Ouattara, as well as former President Henri Konan Bedie and the current leader of Bedie's former ruling party, Emile Constant Bombet.

The parties of Bombet and Ouattara are boycotting the vote.

Until the Christmas Eve coup, Ivory Coast was long considered one of Africa's most stable nations and a bastion of regional stability.

During election campaigning Tuesday, Guei said he had been "chosen spontaneously by the people." After the speech to journalists, about 25 people gathered to cheer while about 100 others watched silently.

The elections threaten to widen ethnic and regional divisions in Ivory Coast, where northerners and foreign-born citizens have long been excluded from the southern-dominated political arena.

Ouattara's main support base is in the north.

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