ROME, Oct 27, 2008 (AFP) - An Italian judge on Tuesday is to issue a first verdict in a whodunnit that has gripped the central town of Perugia for nearly a year since the gruesome murder of a British exchange student there.

ABIDJAN, Oct 23, 2008 (AFP) - An Ivory Coast court on Wednesday handed down jail terms of 20 years and five years to two people for the dumping of toxic waste from a cargo ship in Abidjan in 2006 which killed 17 people and poisoned thousands.

Seven other people charged in the case were acquitted.

ABIDJAN, Oct 23, 2008 (AFP) - Lawyers for two men jailed for dumping deadly toxic waste in Abidjan in 2006 criticised the sentences Thursday, saying many of those who bore responsibility for the scandal had walked free.

'They didn't want the truth to come out,' said lawyer Bambaoule Diabete, whose client Salomon Ugborugbo was sentenced to 20 years.

BOUAKE, Ivory Coast, Oct 12, 2008 (AFP) - Ivory Coast's former rebel New Forces movement which controls the country's northern regions on Saturday suggested postponing upcoming presidential elections.

ABIDJAN, Oct 9, 2008 (AFP) - The trial of seven people accused of complicity in the dumping of poisonous waste at public sites across Ivory Coast's main city of Abidjan two years ago, killing 17 people, was suspended on Wednesday.

ABIDJAN, Oct 1, 2008 (AFP) - The leading defendant in a key toxic waste trial Wednesday said he was misled by an affiliate of the Dutch multinational that brought the poisonous liquid to Ivory Coast in 2006.

ABIDJAN, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - The trial opened in Ivory Coast on Monday of 12 people charged with involvement in a 2006 toxic waste scandal which killed 17 Ivorians and poisoned thousands.

Nine of the 12 were in court to face a raft of charges including poisoning, complicity to poison and breaking environmental and public safety laws.

ABIDJAN, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - The trial opened in Ivory Coast on Monday of 12 people charged with involvement in a 2006 toxic waste scandal which killed 17 Ivorians and poisoned thousands.

Nine of the 12 were in court to face a raft of charges including poisoning, complicity to poison and breaking environmental and public safety laws.

ABIDJAN, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - Ivory Coast Prime Minister Guillaume Soro on Monday appealed for the country's military to stay calm over unpaid wages which have added to tensions in the West African nation.

ABIDJAN, Sept 26, 2008 (AFP) - Ivorian soldiers fired into the air and blockaded roads on Friday in protest at the government's failure to pay their bonuses -- the latest sign of military tensions over a fragile peace accord.

ABIDJAN, Sept 22, 2008 (AFP) - The Ivorian government on Monday banned all milk products imported from China and promised to analyse existing stocks in the Ivory Coast as a tainted milk scandal continued to escalate in China.

ABIDJAN, Sept 22, 2008 (AFP) - Ivory Coast has established a new cocoa management committee to oversee operations of its key export industry, mired in widespread corruption allegations, the government said Monday.

OUAGADOUGOU, Sept 19, 2008 (AFP) - The head of Ivory Coast's electoral committee excludes any delays in the long awaited elections in the West African country 'for now', he told journalists late Thursday.

YAMOUSSOUKRO, September 15, 2008 (AFP) - Disenfranchised Ivorians should get the chance to vote in November after a new general census was launched Monday to update the country's electoral registers.

President Laurent Gbagbo opened the census at an official ceremony which aims to collect data of unregistered Ivorian citizens so that presidential elections can be held on November 30.

ABIDJAN, September 14, 2008 (AFP) - Ivory Coast is set to hold a new general census from Monday that will allow authorities to update the electoral register and eventually hold presidential elections, President Laurent Gbagbo said.

Those who participate will also get new identity cards, the president said this weekend.

ABIDJAN, September 9, 2008 (AFP) - The death toll from inter-ethnic violence in the north of Ivory Coast rose on Tuesday to 10 after two people died of their injuries, a police official said.

ABIDJAN, September 8, 2008 (AFP) - At least eight people have been killed and more than 20 wounded in inter-ethnic violence in the north of Ivory Coast, press reports said Monday.

ABIDJAN, September 5, 2008 (AFP) - Ivory Coast's cocoa sector needs to be comprehensively modernised to deliver its full potential, the deputy chief of the World Bank for Africa, Obiageli Ezekwesili, said here Friday.

'It is not going to be sufficient to change the management in the cocoa sector,' she told a press conference.

ABIDJAN, September 5, 2008 (AFP) - Staff from Ivory Coast's coffee and cocoa marketing body BCC have launched an unlimited strike over back pay that is paralysing exports, an official for the BCC body said Friday.

'The unionists have ransacked' the hall dealing with export operations, leading to a 'paralysis' in the coffee-cocoa trade, said senior BCC official Kouassi Konan.

ABIDJAN, September 2, 2008 (AFP) - The trial of 12 people charged with involvement in the 2006 toxic waste pollution scandal in the Ivory Coast is set to go ahead on September 29, according to court documents released Tuesday.

YAMOUSSOUKRO, August 30, 2008 (AFP) - Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo was named Saturday as his party's candidate for November 30 presidential elections, an official said.

ABIDJAN, August 29, 2008 (AFP) - Ivorians with HIV/AIDS can now get free anti-retroviral treatment in public health centers with foreign funders picking up much of the tab, according to a decree of which AFP obtained a copy Friday.

ABIDJAN, August 27, 2008 (AFP) - Five Ivorian ministers will take part in court hearings beginning on Monday as part of a massive corruption probe into the country's cocoa sector, the ministers said Wednesday.

'The judge scheduled us at the end of ministerial holidays,' one of the ministers told AFP on the condition of anonymity.

BOUAKE, August 22, 2008 (AFP) - Talks began Friday in the central Ivory Coast city of Bouake between leaders of the ex-rebel New Forces movement and disgruntled ex-soldiers demanding special allowances, a military source said.

The process by which eligible voters are identified in Ivory Coast ahead of November presidential ...

The United Nations` peacekeeping mission in Ivory Coast said Saturday its will finance `1,000 ...

The US Secretary of Health and Human Services will arrive Wednesday in Ivory Coast to visit ...

The first shipment of material to make new voter registration cards has arrived in Ivory Coast, a ...

GENEVA, August 4, 2008 (AFP) - The UN's top expert on the effects of toxic waste dumping on human rights will travel to the Ivory Coast on Monday to probe the impact of the country's 2006 waste scandal, the UN announced.

OUAGADOUGOU, July 29, 2008 (AFP) - Burkina Faso's President Blaise Compaore on Tuesday called on all the politicians in Ivory Coast to do their utmost to ensure the November presidential elections there will go ahead as planned.

UNITED NATIONS, July 29, 2008 (AFP) - The UN Security Council on Tuesday unanimously approved a French-drafted resolution extending for six months the mandate of UN and French peacekeepers in Ivory Coast so they can support the holding of a long-delayed presidential election.

OUAGADOUGOU, July 28, 2008 (AFP) - Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo sought Monday to reassure neighbouring Burkina Faso about the fragile peace in his homeland, telling lawmakers on a landmark visit that the war was over.

OUAGADOUGOU, July 28, 2008 (AFP) - Ties between Ivory Coast and neighbouring Burkina Faso should be the backbone of West Africa, Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo said on Sunday on the first day of a landmark visit here.

OUAGADOUGOU, July 27, 2008 (AFP) - Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo arrived in Burkina Faso on Sunday on a landmark trip that signals the end of an era of troubled relations between the west African neighbours.

On his first visit to Burkina Faso since taking office in 2000, Gbagbo was met on arrival at Ouagadougou airport by Burkina President Blaise Compaore. No statements were made.

OUAGADOUGOU, July 26, 2008 (AFP) - Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo will start a three-day visit to Burkina Faso Sunday in a sign that the previously troubled relationship between the neighbours is warming up.

UNITED NATIONS, July 24, 2008 (AFP) - France is proposing to keep UN and French peacekeepers in Ivory Coast until next January 31 to help stage free and fair polls late this year, according to a copy of a draft resolution obtained by AFP Thursday.

ABIDJAN, July 23, 2008 (AFP) - President Laurent Gbagbo said he intends to change a law that allocates minimal state control over Ivory Coast's oil production, as he denounced accusations he has taken oil money.

This law 'has become a convention' and 'I will change it', Gbagbo said as part of a meeting televised Wednesday.

PARIS, July 23, 2008 (AFP) - A French judge investigating the disappearance of a Canadian journalist in Ivory Coast went this week to President Nicolas Sarkozy's offices to obtain documents held there on the case, officials said Wednesday.

ABIDJAN, July 22, 2008 (AFP) - In the last month life inside the sinister main prison in Ivory Coast, the maison d'arret et de correction d'Abidjan (Maca), has taken on a chocolate flavour as it filled up with top cocoa officials arrested in a large scale corruption probe.