WASHINGTON — President Laurent Gbagbo vowed Friday that he would not cede power in Ivory Coast, while Obama administration officials warned that he was running out of time to accept an offer they had made to help him leave the country peacefully.
Mr. Gbagbo, in an end-of-year address, mocked the intensifying calls for him to step aside as he continued to dispute that his rival, Alassane Ouattara, had won November’s presidential election, as determined by the nation’s electoral commission and certified by international observers.
“We are not going to give up,” Mr. Gbagbo said, calling the efforts to displace him a coup d’état attempt. “Our greatest duty to our country is to defend it from foreign attack.”
His remarks came as Obama administration officials provided additional details on Friday about their efforts to offer Mr. Gbagbo a graceful way out. Starting in early December, they said, officials approached Mr. Gbagbo’s representatives about the possibility of finding him a position in an international organization, as sort of a consolation prize.
They also proposed that he relocate to the United States, where relatives of his have lived, or to some other location in Europe or Africa.
“One would not rule that out, if it is a way to resolve the situation,” Philip J. Crowley, a State Department spokesman, said Friday. “If he is prepared to leave, we can discuss where he might go.”
The United States and the European Union imposed travel bans on Mr. Gbagbo and his family in December, so lifting those restrictions would have to be negotiated. Mr. Gbagbo, who has been in office since 2000, is believed to have stepdaughters who have lived in Atlanta. But the offer could be withdrawn if Mr. Gbagbo’s supporters followed through on threats to take action against United Nations peacekeepers there or civilians, United States officials said.
“The longer this goes the more problematic this potentially becomes,” an Obama administration official said Friday, asking not to be identified because the diplomacy was continuing. “He has a window of opportunity. But the opportunity is a finite one.”
The pressure on Mr. Gbagbo continued to escalate Friday as Navi Pillay, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, warned Mr. Gbagbo in a letter from Geneva that he and other Ivory Coast leaders faced possible human rights
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