Côte d'Ivoire transitional cabinet meets for first time in four months, UN says

Côte d'Ivoire's Council of Ministers met today for the first time since March, fulfilling the pledges that political party leaders made at a summit convened and co-chaired by United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan late last month in Ghana.

Three opposition ministers whom President Laurent Gbagbo had dismissed from the Government of National Transition were among those participating in the meeting, said Albert Tévoédjré, the Secretary-General's Special Representative and chief of the UN Operation in Côte d'Ivoire (ONUCI).

On the Council agenda is implementing the January 2003 Linas-Marcoussis Agreement, which ended bitter fighting between factions in the north and the south and which had caused the four-month stalemate. It calls for Mr. Gbagbo and Prime Minister Seydou Diarra to redistribute powers and for a new nationality code that would expand the field of political candidates.