Report: French soldiers fire on Ivory Coast mob
Pregnant woman, 10 others killed, officials say
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (CNN) -- French soldiers opened fire Tuesday on a mob at the entrance to a hotel in Abidjan, killing 11 people, including two police officers and a pregnant woman, Ivory Coast police said.
The incident happened about outside the Hotel Ivoire, journalist Carrie Giardino told CNN. In the past few days, protesters have gathered outside the hotel, but Tuesday the mob charged toward the entrance.
Giardino quoted hospital officials as saying hundreds of people were injured.
She said an angry mob had gathered outside a hospital where many victims were taken. As gunshots were heard, some of the crowd dispersed, but many stayed.
The dead included two police officers, two women -- one of them three months pregnant -- and seven men, hospital officials told Giardino.
The violence came hours after South African President Thabo Mbeki met with Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo to offer assistance with peace negotiations. A spokesman for Mbeki said Gbagbo has taken steps toward implementing peace agreements struck earlier with rebels who hold the northern part of the country.
Mbeki, who visited on behalf of the African Union, is scheduled to meet with those rebel groups later in the week in South Africa, spokesman Bheki Khumalo said.
Mbeki and Gbagbo spent about four hours together.
"The president ... is very pleased with the progress and the steps that are being taken," Khumalo said. "The president would like to see a political solution achieved in Cote d'Ivoire."
Violence erupted between France and the Ivory Coast on Saturday, when Ivory Coast warplanes bombed a French position near Bouake in the north.
The bombings killed nine French peacekeepers and an American aid worker, and violated a 2003 cease-fire agreement between the government and rebels.
The French retaliated by destroying two Russian-built Sukhoi 25 aircraft at Yamoussoukro Airport, where the Ivory Coast government has based its operations against rebel movements.
In addition, the French Defense Ministry said it destroyed three helicopters in Yamoussoukro, the nation's seat of government, in what it called a pre-emptive strike.
About 6,000 U.N. peacekeepers and 4,000 French soldiers have been trying to keep the peace in the buffer zone between the rebel-controlled, mostly Muslim north and the government-controlled, mostly Christian south.
But the government has been sending Ivory Coast warplanes into the north, exchanging fire with French troops.
Khumalo said he could not release any more details of Mbeki's meeting with Gbagbo until Mbeki reported to African Union officials on the negotiations. He did say, however, that Gbagbo told Mbeki that he is willing to implement the conditions of previous peace deals.
Meanwhile, a spokeswoman for the French Foreign Ministry said French planes were dispatched to the Ivory Coast on Tuesday to deliver food and medicine to French families, many of whom had sought shelter on a French military base.
The planes are to return to France with French citizens who need medical attention, she said.
Looting has been widespread in the city, and cars on streets have been burned and overturned by mobs.
In a televised address Sunday, Gbagbo said the country regrets "events which got out of control," and expressed condolences to families of Ivorian, French and American victims.
The Ivory Coast is the world's largest exporter of cocoa, but exports have ground to a halt because of the unrest.
"This area is the breadbasket of West Africa," Khumalo said. "It's important that stability return."
