France ends airlift of Westerners from Ivory Coast

ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast -- France concluded one of the largest evacuations in post-independence Africa yesterday and the UN Security Council imposed an immediate arms embargo against Ivory Coast, stepping up pressure to end the violence that spurred the exodus.

Worried families piled into the last two jumbo jets, bringing to more than 5,000 the number of Westerners fleeing an upsurge in violence sparked by clashes between France and its former West African colony. With no hope of rescue, more than 10,000 African nationals have fled to neighboring counries, the UN refugee agency said.

Two French-organized flights left late yesterday to Paris and to neighboring Ghana. They are the last in six days of shuttles overseen by the French military, French spokesman Jacques Combarieu said.

With the subsiding of last week's antiforeigner rampages and the restoration of commercial flights in Ivory Coast's largest city, any other foreigners who want to leave will be able to do so on their own, Combarieu said.

"It was terrible," said one 10-year German resident of Ivory Coast, who would give only his first name of Helmut, awaiting one of yesterday's last evacuation flights. The aid worker described hiding in the bush around Ivory Coast's southern cocoa port of San Pedro with other expatriates while mobs sacked French shops and warehouses.

"But I'll come back" when Ivory Coast calms down, he said. "I'm sure I want to come back."

Later yesterday, the UN Security Council voted to impose an immediate arms embargo against Ivory Coast. The resolution gives the government and rebels a month to get the peace process back on track or face a travel ban and an asset freeze against those blocking peace and violating human rights. Also included in the ban is the incitement of public hatred or violence -- a reference to hate messages on television and radio that have been whipping up anti-French anger.

At a meeting in the Nigerian capital Abuja on Sunday, African leaders backed the embargo and other sanctions. Yesterday, South African President Thabo Mbeki expressed optimism that his efforts to stem the upsurge of violence in Ivory Coast will bear fruit. Mbeki has been leading efforts to solve the conflict.

The Ivory Coast reopened the nation's civil war Nov. 4 with airstrikes on the rebel-held north. Two days later, Ivory Coast warplanes bombed a French peacekeeping post, killing nine French troops and an American aid worker and plunging the world's top cocoa producer into its current unprecedented crisis.

France then blew up Ivory Coast's air force on the tarmac.

Loyalists took to the streets in five days of violent attacks in response, burning and looting French businesses and schools across the south.