Ivory Coast: Northern rebels play down talk of secession

Rebel forces occupying the north of Cote d'Ivoire have played down suggestions that they may declare a separate breakaway state following the latest setback to implementing a year-old peace agreement. Rebel leader Guillaume Soro told a rally in the rebel capital Bouake on 4 April that his "New Forces" movement had set up its own administration in the north and had got schools functioning again without the help of the government in Abidjan. The rebel authorities, he added, were even ready to pay regular salaries to their fighters for the first time.