French ministers 'obstructed' Ivory Coast bombing probe
By Antton Rouget
In November 2004 nine French soldiers and an American humanitarian worker were killed at Bouaké in the Ivory Coast in a bombing raid carried out by that country's air force. Yet more than eleven years later the foreign mercenaries who are thought to have conducted the raid have never been brought to account. Now a French investigating judge has recommended that three senior French ministers who served under President Jacques Chirac at the time - Dominique de Villepin, Michèle Alliot-Marie and Michel Barnier – stand trial for hindering the initial investigation. Antton Rouget reports.
More than eleven years after nine French soldiers and an American humanitarian worker were killed in a bombing raid at Bouaké in the Ivory Coast, the judicial investigation is finally coming to a climax. After a decade of probes, the involvement of four examining magistrates, and the declassification of a whole raft of secret defence documents, a French judge wants three senior ministers who served under President Jacques Chirac to stand trial for their alleged role in hampering the initial investigation.
