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Ivory Coast begins questioning Gbagbo

08 May 2011 02:20 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. Ivory Coast’s state prosecutor has begun formally questioning former Ivorian leader Laurent Gbagbo days after heavy fighting led to his capture in Abidjan, APA reports quoting Press TV.

"Laurent Gbagbo has been questioned in the presence of his personal doctor," AFP quoted prosecutor Simplice Kouadio Koffi as saying.

Gbagbo is under house arrest awaiting trial for alleged crimes and his role in the violence that followed the presidential election last November.

The former president’s refusal to step down after the elections sparked a crisis in the world’s biggest cocoa producer.

The impasse led to the deaths of an estimated 3,000 people, the displacement of more than one million others and a halt in the country’s cocoa exports.

The new president Alassane Ouattara has been sworn-in by the Constitutional Council, which originally rejected the vote result in favor of Gbagbo.