The former president of Côte d’Ivoire, Laurent Gbagbo, met, on Sunday afternoon, November 10, in Abidjan, with the French ambassador to Côte d’Ivoire, Jean-Christophe Belliard, Agence France-Presse (AFP) learned. thanks to a French diplomatic source. An unprecedented exchange between a French official and the former head of state since December 2010.
The meeting lasted more than two hours, with “rich exchanges, without taboos, directly and spontaneously in a warm atmosphere”this source said. “This ends a long silence”he added.
Laurent Gbagbo, in power between 2000 and 2011, maintained often tense relations with Paris during his mandate, which he long accused of having precipitated his fall. Gbabgo was forced from power after a bloody post-election crisis and several days of French bombing that led to his arrest on April 11, 2011.
Candidate but not eligible
Many topics were discussed on Sunday: the economic and political issues of Côte d’Ivoire, regional issues, beyond the Sahel issue, or even the perception of France in the region. “The meeting was cordial and went well”Habiba Touré, spokesperson for the African People’s Party-Côte d’Ivoire (PPA-CI), Laurent Gbagbo’s party, told AFP without making further comments.
“This approach is part of the desire to speak with all political actors in Côte d’Ivoire”less than a year before the presidential elections, detailed the French diplomatic source, who recalled that Belliard also met with Tidjane Thiam, another important opponent in the Ivory Coast.
A few months after his arrest, in April 2011, Laurent Gbagbo was transferred to The Hague (Netherlands) and spent eight years behind bars, accused of crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court. Definitively acquitted in March 2021, he returned to the Ivory Coast in June of the same year and founded the PPA-CI.
At 79 years old, he was nominated as his party’s candidate for the presidential elections in October 2025, but for the moment remains ineligible. In fact, he was removed from the electoral lists after a conviction in Ivory Coast in 2018, for events related to the 2010-2011 crisis.
