[Daily Nation (Kenya)] Troops loyal to defiant Cote d'Voire leader Laurent Gbagbo laid siege on his rival Alassane Ouattara's headquarters on Monday, in the first armed standoff of the west African nation's two-week-old crisis.As EU foreign ministers in Brussels agreed measures against Gbagbo and his senior supporters, the incumbent deployed troops and gendarmes on access routes to Ouattara's United Nations-protected waterfront hotel base.
Gbagbo and Ouattara both declared themselves president in the wake of last month's disputed election. Ouattara has been recognised by the international community, but Ivorian army chiefs continue to back Gbagbo.
Pro-Gbagbo security forces blocked roads to the hotel from around midday until nightfall, then fell back into more discreet positions to monitor the situation, while allowing traffic to pass, witnesses and soldiers said.
A 10:00 pm to 5:00 am curfew remained in place on Monday, state television said, and will be prolonged from Tuesday for at least another week while being reduced in duration to the hours between midnight and 5:00 am.
Show of force
If the show of force outside the Abidjan hotel was designed to intimidate the Ouattara camp it failed. His prime minister, former rebel leader Guillaume Soro, announced a plan to retake government headquarters by Friday.
Former rebel fighters from the New Forces (FN) armed with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades took up defensive positions around the waterfront Hotel Golf, alongside UN peacekeepers equipped with armoured vehicles.
At around midday, a few hundred metres away, gendarmes and elite troops loyal to Gbagbo took control of two positions on the road running past the hotel, effectively controlling access to Ouattara's base in the port city.
The loyalist forces were equipped with trucks mounted with machine-guns and had rocket-launchers of their own, but there was no sign they were preparing to launch an assault and the situation was calm by nightfall.
