Security forces in Ivory Coast killed as many as three people when they fired live rounds and tear gas at hundreds of protesters in Gagnoa today, Reuters quoted opposition and hospital sources as saying from the southwestern town. "There are deaths but I cannot tell you the exact number as that is up to the authorities," a hospital source told Reuters. An opposition member who was at the demonstration put the number of dead at three but there was no independent confirmation. Friday's violence is the latest in a series of demonstrations in the top cocoa grower since President Laurent Gbagbo dissolved the government and the electoral commission after a row over voter registration last Friday. A separate hospital source said earlier that dozens of people were being treated there, mainly for gunshot wounds. Cocoa cooperative manager Francois Badiel said the demonstration had brought the town, in a key cocoa producing area in the southwest of Ivory Coast, to a standstill. West Africa's former economic powerhouse is under increasing international pressure to restart an electoral process that is meant to end a crisis sparked by a 2002-2003 war but is already several years overdue.
